The start was to be made at two o'clock, and the chimes on the dining room mantel of the Kimball home had just warned Cora that half the hour between one and two had gone by. "We take no note of time but from its flight," quoted Cora to herself, hurrying through the room to crowd a last few things into her motor trunk. "I wonder where Jack is?" At that very moment Jack's inevitable whistle was heard, and the next, the boy was in the room, looking as deliciously lazy as ever, in that way so peculiar to boys who have a great deal to do at the time; the science of which studied indifference is absolutely impossible for a girl to fathom. "Why this fluttering fluster, sis?" he asked, crumbling deeper in the leather-cushioned chair. "You will positively get overheated and ruin--your--complex--ion!" This last was drawled out with the most aggravating yawn. "Why, Jack, I have to be in my car at ten minutes to two, and do you see the time?" "No, but I hear it. I wonder who on earth put a clock to ticking. Bad enough to hear the hours knock, but this constant tick----" "Jack, whatever you have to say to me please say it," interrupted the sister. "I know perfectly well that this preamble is portentous." "No, it's merely pretentious," answered Jack, drawing from his pocket the card that Andy had turned over to him. "Do you happen to remember where you dropped this?" It was a simple guess, but Jack tried it. "Dropped that?" repeated Cora, taking the card from his hand. "Why, I declare! I have looked everywhere for that. I wanted it last night. I had actually forgotten the name of the cottage, and I wanted to give it to you for your note book. Where did you find it?" "Didn't find it, it found me. Andy gave it to me." "Andy!" and Cora's eyes showed her surprise. "Yes. He said the old lady, Ramsy, found it in your strawberry girls' room." "Whatever are you talking about, Jack?" demanded Cora with some impatience. "Don't you know I have to hurry, and you are teasing me this way?" Jack went over to his sister, and put his bare brown arm around her neck. She looked up from the folding of her trinkets, and smiled into his face. "Now, see here, sis," he said, "I am telling you the exact truth, and when I say exact, I mean exact. Andy told me he caught this card on a fly as it flew out the Ramsy window, when they were letting fly their opinions about the motor girls. Andy caught the card on the first bounce, stuck it in his pocket--no, let me see! He carried it against his heart, between his second and third ribs----" "Oh, I know!" interrupted Cora. "I dropped that in the shed when I opened my purse to pay for the berries. I thought I felt something slip from my hand." "There," and Jack made a comical effort to pat himself on the back. "Jack, my boy, you are a wonder! If you don't know what you want just guess it." "And they said I gave that card to the girls? To give them a place to run away to, I suppose."