“It won’t be quite as simple as that, though I don’t know exactly what Agatha has said; merely, as I told you before, we are going to try to avoid unnecessary responsibility in everything, and keep the time we gain for ourselves. Possibly, after all, that is what is really meant by the simple life. “To have no maids wouldn’t be doing that. Juno is a treasure, and to have no cook would be putting an awful responsibility upon me; while if I had to get up and make early breakfast for Billy every morning, it would be putting upon him the responsibility of tiring me out. We’re not going to ask a human being to visit us, for then we should be responsible if they didn’t like our ways, but to any one who takes the initiative of inviting themselves, we shall be as nice as we know how. And mind you, Pussy, if guests come in pairs, and choose the full o’ the moon, we’ve a lovely comfortable bench that we bought of a pedler. It is set nearly on the edge of the woods, where it’s all ferny and sweet smelling, and quite out of sight of the house. If our guests, who invite themselves, choose to go there, of course we shan’t have to be responsible for what happens! Now I must run up and see mummy, for Billy’s coming for me in about five minutes, and I’ll give you a chance to quiz him all you wish.” “Hopeless,” sighed Agatha, despondently, as the door closed; “but what can you expect when she was born eccentric?—and Billy always agrees with her in everything. He even wears a long mustache when all the other men of his class are smooth-shaven, simply because Marjory said she could recognize him in the street two blocks sooner than if he were without. There is one thing certain, _I_ shall not go to Oaklands unless I have a proper invitation.” “Perhaps,” Pussy began, and then choked and started again, “perhaps two of you would like to drive up town with me. I see the cab is here, and it’s more than a shower.” No one else was ready to leave, however, and in going out, who should Pussy bump into but the bridegroom, who was coming up the steps arm in arm with another man, who at the sight of the now blushing Miss Pussy, raised his forgotten umbrella, took her to the cab, and then concluded that it would be only polite to shield her from the rain at the other end of the route. CHAPTER II Marjory and Billy Kent were seated at their breakfast table, which, indeed, was lunch and dinner table also, and was spread on the back porch. The fact that it was Saturday, and therefore “Massa’s day to home,” accounted for the way in which the pair were lingering over their meal, as well as for the chuckling good nature of June, short for Juno, who paused to gaze affectionately at “the chillun” every time she came near the little window that connected the kitchen with this outdoor dining room.