"My good friends," I said, "don't let this disturb you for a minute. I am not so pressed for time that I cannot wait on your reasonable convenience. Your tavern is well kept and the food is wholesome. I think I may say that my old friends in Meadowvale will interest me until we can come to an amicable understanding. Suppose, to be sure of a full meeting, that we fix the time of conference at day after to-morrow--a little late in the afternoon." After this suggestion had been received with suitable expressions of gratitude, we journeyed together to the village, where I was duly turned over to old Pettigrew. And then, as the day was by no means done, I strolled down the street and, most naturally and quite unthinkingly, found myself a few minutes later looking over the Eastmann gate at Phyllis on the porch. To say that this charming girl was surprised by my sudden appearance was no less true than to admit that she did not seem in the least displeased. I positively had no intention of going in, but before I knew it I was sitting beside her, relating in the most casual way the reason of my coming. "How good it was of you," said the ingenuous creature, "and how delighted and grateful Meadowvale will be. It must be glorious to be rich enough to do things for other people." Now it is not a disagreeable sensation to feel that one is rich and good and glorious in the large gray eyes of a very pretty woman, and I was conscious of the mild intoxication from the compliment. "It is, indeed," I answered magnanimously. "I have always maintained that money is given to us in trust for those around us, and that in making others happy we find our greatest happiness. I regret that I have not wholly lived up to this undeniably correct principle." "It will require at least a thousand dollars," she said naively. "Oh, at least." She was silent a moment. Then she said: "I was wondering what I would do if I had a thousand dollars to give away." "What do you think you would do?" "Speaking for my own preferences I think I should like to establish a country club." "The very thing. If there is one crying want more than another in Meadowvale it is a country club, with golf links, tennis courts, and shower baths." "Now you are laughing at me." "Not at all. Fancy old Hank and you playing a foursome with Aunt Mary and me for the cider and apples. Why, it would add years of robustness to our waning lives." "No," said the girl decisively. "It isn't feasible." "Then," I went on musingly, "we might have an Art Institute, or the Phyllis Kinglake School of Expression, or the Meadowvale Woman's Club, or the Colonial Dames, or, best of all, the Daughters of the American Revolution."