“Really, Mrs. Morrow, Edith inspired me to such respect for her indomitable courage and pluck,” went on the girl candidly, “that I shall always keep a very warm place in my heart for her, notwithstanding that she sometimes gets on my nerves. Things went on swimmingly then until that awful drought came. We had no way of watering the garden except by watering-pots, and then we couldn’t do our weeding, or cultivating, until late in the afternoon on account of the hot sun. But we did our best, and we have been repaid,” smiled Nathalie, “although we did not produce as much as I had hoped. Still—well, you’ll see at the pageant to-morrow.” Nathalie, suddenly realizing that she had kept Mrs. Morrow standing for some time, while she rattled on about that garden, now bade her a hasty good-morning and hurried into the bank. The young president of the Liberty Girls’ club passed a somewhat troubled night, oppressed with the anxiety of her onerous responsibility, knowing that the following day would be a well-filled one. As the proposer and planner of the pageant there were numerous details to arrange at the very last moment, and she was so afraid that she would oversleep, that she awakened several times with a nervous start, only to find everything enveloped in darkness. Arousing finally, to see the East streaked with red, and the golden rim of the sun gleaming above a silver line of clouds, she sprang out of bed with a devout little prayer of thankfulness that the day at least was to be a sunshiny one. An early breakfast, a hurried doing of her customary duties, and then she and Grace—in the latter’s car—were off to inspect the floats, eighteen of them, all ready in barns, or garages, awaiting her word that they were properly equipped for the liberty parade, which was to set forth on its journey through the town at two in the afternoon. And then, with many misgivings, fearing that the whole thing might prove a fizzle,—for of course, many things had been wrong,—she hurried home for luncheon. Then came a hurried dressing, a whirl in an automobile, and she was dazedly taking her seat, a post of honor, on the front row of the grand-stand, erected by the Boy Scouts and Peter, in front of Mrs. Van Vorst’s high garden-walls. She barely had time to realize that the notables of the village were seated to the right and left of her, and to exchange a few greetings with one or two old-time friends, when she heard the ringing of a bell, the bell in the tower of the old Presbyterian church. This was the signal that the Liberty Pageant, way up at the other end of the town, was to issue from its shelter of green trees in front of the brick schoolhouse, and set forth on its march down through Main Street, the most important thoroughfare of the sleepy little town, with its wide, asphalted road shaded by noble old elms. CHAPTER V THE LIBERTY PAGEANT