"But who----" Mrs. Kendall stopped abruptly. A dawning comprehension came into her eyes. "You mean--Harry, she _was_ at the bottom of it! I remember now. It was only a week or two ago that she used those same words to me. She insisted that you would beat me and--and bang me 'round. Oh, Margaret, Margaret, my poor little girl!" The doctor smiled; then he shook his head gravely. "Poor child! She hasn't seen much of conjugal felicity; has she?" he murmured; then, softly: "It is left for us, sweetheart, to teach her--that." The color deepened in Mrs. Kendall's cheeks. Her eyes softened, then danced merrily. "But you haven't signed--this, sir, yet!" she challenged laughingly, as she held out the paper. He caught both paper and hands in a warm clasp. "But I will," he declared. "Wait and see!" Not twenty hours later Bobby McGinnis halted at the great gate of the driveway at Five Oaks and gave a peculiar whistle. Almost instantly Margaret flew across the lawn to meet him. "Oh, it's jest a little matter of business," greeted Bobby, with careless ease. "I've got that 'ere document here all signed. I reckoned the doctor wouldn't lose no time makin' sure ter do his part." "Bobby, not the contract--so soon!" exulted Margaret. "Sure! Why not? I told him ter please sign to once an' return. An' he did, 'course. I reckoned he meant business in this little matter, an' he reckoned I did, too. There wa'n't nothin' for him ter do but sign, 'course." Margaret drew her brows together in a thoughtful frown. "But he might have--refused," she suggested. Bobby gave her a scornful glance. "Refused--an' lost the chance of marryin' at all? Not much!" he asserted with emphasis. "Well, anyhow, I'm glad he didn't," sighed Margaret, as she clutched the precious paper close to her heart. "I should 'a' hated to have refused outright to let him marry her when mother--Bobby, mother actually seems to _want_ to have him!" CHAPTER VI Margaret had been at home four weeks when the invitation for Patty, Arabella, Clarabella, and three of the Whalens to visit her, finally left her mother's hands. There had not been a day of all those four weeks that Margaret had not talked of the coming visit. At first, to be sure, she had not called it a visit; she had referred to it as the time when "Patty and the Whalens come here to live." Gradually, however, her mother had persuaded her to let them "try it and see how they liked it"; and to this compromise Margaret finally gave a somewhat reluctant consent.