But Julie was too terribly disappointed to pretend that she was not. "I know all that," she half sobbed and turned toward the window across the aisle, "but I was so happy when I s'posed I was to cook for Dan, and when you and I were to be the ones to take care of him. But now Jane will get all the honor and everything, and we'll have to be bossed around worse than if we were at home, for Dad's there to take our part." Gerald's clear hazel eyes gazed at his sister rebukingly. "Julie," he said, with an earnestness far beyond his years, "the train hasn't started yet and if you'n I are going to think of ourselves we'd better go back home. Shall we, Julie?" The little girl shook her head vigorously. "No, no. I don't want to go home." She clung to the back of a seat as though she feared she were going to be taken forcibly from the train. Gerald leaned over to whisper to her, but he first gave her a little kiss on the ear, then he said: "Julie, you'n I will have oodles of fun up there in the mountains. If Jane isn't too snappish, I'll be glad she's along, because, of course, she'll be able to take care of Dan better than we could." Then suddenly he laughed gleefully. "I've got it!" he confided to the girl, who had looked around curiously. She could not imagine how Gerald could laugh when such a tragic thing had happened. "You're dippy about pretending, Julie. You once said you could pretend anything you wanted to, and make it seem real. Well, here's your chance. Every time Jane is snappy, pretend she has said something pleasant. That'll be a hard one, but for Dan's sake, I'm willing to give it a try." Julie's mania had always been "pretending," and she had often wished that Gerald would play it with her, but he was a matter-of-fact sort of a lad, and his reply had been that real things were fun enough for him. The little girl's face brightened. At last her brother was willing to play her favorite game. "That will be a hard one," she agreed. Then, as she was lunged against the boy, she also laughed. "Oh, goodie!" she whispered. "Now the train is really started--nobody can send us back home. Honest, I was skeered Jane might want to. She thinks we're so terribly in the way." Happy as Dan was, because the sister he so loved was to accompany him to the West, he did not forget the two who had been willing to go with him and care for him in the beginning, and, as soon as the train was well under way, he called to the children. "Come here, Julie. I've saved the window side of my seat for you, and I'm sure Jane will let Gerald sit by the window on her seat. Now, isn't this jolly?" The children wedged into the places toward which he was beckoning them. Julie glanced almost fearfully up at the older girl she had accidentally jostled in passing, but Jane was gazing out of the window deep in dreams. Dan noticed his sister-pal's expression. How he hoped she was not regretting her hasty decision.