“Well, there’s so much to be done,” she said. “I certainly am glad to see you, though. But suppose we have lunch first. I’m hungry as a bear, and see, it’s five minutes to twelve. Can you eat now?” “Oh, any time!” he said indifferently. “What is it you want done, anyway? This room’s a mess. Some dump, the whole house! It makes me disgusted.” He stood with his hands in his pockets, surveying the desolate scene, and voicing Cornelia’s own thoughts of a few moments before. But it was Cornelia’s forte to rise to an occasion when every one else was disheartened. She put on a cheery smile. “Just you wait, brother, till I get through. I’ve plans for that room, and it won’t be so bad when it gets cleaned and fixed a little. Suppose you take those boxes down cellar, and those pictures and tubs, and the old trunk and chest out to the shed room beyond the kitchen, while I scramble some eggs and settle the coffee. Everything else is ready. Then after lunch we’ll get to work. I shall need your help to turn the piano around and open those boxes of books. Why do you suppose they put the bookcase face against the wall, with the piano in front of it? Seems to me that was dumb.” “All movers are dumb!” declared Carey with a sweep of his arm, as if he would include the whole world. But he went to work vigorously, and carried out the things with a whirl, and Cornelia perceived she must rush to have a plate of cakes before he was done with his assigned task. “Aw, gee! You saved me some cakes!” he said with a grin of delight when they sat down at the table. “I oughtta ’ve got up for breakfast. But I was all in. We took a joy ride last night down to Baltimore. I saw your poetry. It was great. Who wrote it? You, of course.” “We wanted you to be sure to get up, but of course you must have been sleepy riding all that way in the wind. It must have been great, though. It was full moon last night, wasn’t it?” said his sister, ignoring the horror that the thought of the “joy ride” gave her. “It sure was,” said the boy, kindling at the memory. “The fellas put ether in the gas, and she certainly did hum. We just went whizzing. It was a jim-dandy car, twelve-cylinder, some chariot! B’longs to a fella named Brand Barlock. He’s a prince, that boy is! Has thousands of dollars to spend as he pleases; and you’d never know he had a cent, he’s so big-hearted. Love him like a brother. Why, he’d let me take that car anywhere, and never turn a hair; and it cost some money, that car did, this year’s racing-model! Gee, but she’s a winner. Goes like a streak of greased lightning.”