"But don't you see it's different in this case?" the boy suggested. "I'm only about half a boy, just now. Besides, Miss Teddy, if you'll only come over again, I promise to make up for it, as soon as I'm able to go to see you." Theodora's face brightened. "Do you honestly want me to come again?" "Of course. Else I shouldn't ask you. Come over the fence again. I shall be up here, 'most every pleasant morning, and everybody else is busy, fixing up the house. Come to-morrow," he urged. "I will, if I can. Sometimes I'm busy." "By the way," the boy added abruptly; "maybe I ought to tell you my name. Probably you know it, though." "No." Theodora looked up expectantly. She had an appetite for high-sounding names, and she had decided that Valentine Mortimer would just suit the present instance. "Well, I'm Will Farrington; but everybody calls me Billy." "Oh." Then Theodora unexpectedly began to laugh. "We ought to be good friends," she said; "for our names are about equally imposing. Billy and Teddy! Could anything be more prosaic? Good-by," she added, as she rose. "Truly, I must go home now." Billy held out his hand. It looked rather white and thin, as Theodora's brown, strong fingers closed over it. "Good-by," he said reluctantly. "Do come again whenever you can. Remember there are five of you and only one of me, and be as neighborly as you can." Theodora mounted the fence. At the top, she paused and looked back. "I will come," she said. "I'll get round Hope in some way or other. Good-by till to-morrow." She nodded brightly, and jumped down out of sight, on the other side of the fence. CHAPTER THREE It was the first of September, and the sunshine lay yellow on the fields. Phebe McAlister and her chief friend and crony, Isabel St. John, sat side by side on a rough board fence, not far from the McAlister grounds, feasting upon turnips. The turnips were unripe and raw, and nothing but an innate spirit of perversity could have induced the girls to eat them. Moreover, each had an abundant supply of exactly similar vegetables in her own home garden, yet they had wandered away, to prey upon the turnip patch of Mr. Elnathan Rogers. "Good, aren't they?" Phebe asked, as the corky, hard root cracked under her jaws. "Fine." Isabel rolled her morsel under her tongue; then, when Phebe's attention was distracted, she furtively threw it down back of the fence. "I believe I like 'em better this way than I do cooked." This addition was strictly true, for Isabel never touched turnips at home. "I want another." Phebe jumped down and helped herself to two more turnips, carefully choosing the largest and best, and ruthlessly sacrificing a half-dozen more in the process. "Here, Isabel, take your pick." Isabel held out her hand, hesitated, then, with a radiant smile of generosity, ostentatiously helped herself to the smaller. But Phebe held firmly to its bunch of green leaves. "No, take the other, Isabel," she urged. "I'd rather leave it for you."