“Adam, you’re a dandy!” cried Kate.

“I am having a whole buggy load of fun, and you ought to go,” said he.  “It’s all right!  Don’t you worry!  I’ll take care of you.”

“Why, thank you, Adam!” said Kate.  “That is the first time any one ever offered to take care of me in my life.  With me it always has been pretty much of a ‘go-it-alone’ proposition.”

“What of Nancy Ellen’s did you take?” he asked.  “Why didn’t you get some gloves?  Your hands are so red and work-worn.  Mother’s never look that way.”

“Your mother never has done the rough field work I do, and I haven’t taken time to be careful.  They do look badly.  I wish I had taken a pair of the lady’s gloves; but I doubt if she would have survived that.  I understand that one of the unpardonable sins is putting on gloves belonging to any one else.”

Then the train came and Kate climbed aboard with Adam’s parting injunction in her ears:  “Sit beside an open window on this side!”

So she looked for and found the window and as she seated herself she saw Adam on the outside and leaned to speak to him again.  Just as the train started he thrust his hand inside, dropped his dollar on her lap, and in a tense whisper commanded her:  “Get yourself some gloves!” Then he ran.

Kate picked up the dollar, while her eyes dimmed with tears.

“Why, the fine youngster!” she said.  “The Jim-dandy fine youngster!”

Adam could not remember when he ever had been so happy as he was driving home.  He found his mother singing, his father in a genial mood, so he concluded that the greatest thing in the world to make a whole family happy was to do something kind for someone else.  But he reflected that there would be far from a happy family at his grandfather’s; and he was right.  Grandmother Bates came in from her hoeing at eleven o’clock tired and hungry, expecting to find the wash dry and dinner almost ready.  There was no wash and no odour of food.  She went to the wood-shed and stared unbelievingly at the cold stove, the tubs of soaking clothes.

She turned and went into the kitchen, where she saw no signs of Kate or of dinner, then she lifted up her voice and shouted:  “Nancy Ellen!”

Nancy Ellen came in a hurry.  “Why, Mother, what is the matter?” she cried.

“Matter, yourself!” exclaimed Mrs. Bates.  “Look in the wash room!  Why aren’t the clothes on the line?  Where is that good-for-nothing Kate?”

Nancy Ellen went to the wash room and looked.  She came back pale and amazed.  “Maybe she is sick,” she ventured.  “She never has been; but she might be!  Maybe she has lain down.”

“On Monday morning!  And the wash not out!  You simpleton!” cried Mrs. Bates.

Nancy Ellen hurried upstairs and came back with bulging eyes.

“Every scrap of her clothing is gone, and half of mine!”

“She’s gone to that fool Normal-thing!  Where did she get the money?” cried Mrs. Bates.