“I will; but of course there is not enough money to go around, Kitty, even if we all succeed in our vacation plans.  Julia will never have any pretty dresses if she stays with us, and she loves pretty dresses.  Why didn’t the Fergusons adopt her before mother had made her over?”

“Yes,” chimed in Kathleen.  “Then everybody would have been glad, but now we shall miss her!  Think of missing Judy!  We would never have believed it!”

“It’s like seeing how a book turns out, to watch her priggishness and smuggishness all melting away,” Nancy said.  “I shouldn’t like to see her slip back into the old Judyisms, and neither would mother.  Mother’ll probably keep her, for I know Mr. Manson thinks it’s only a matter of a few months before Uncle Allan dies.”

“And mother wouldn’t want a Carey to grow up into an imitation Gladys Ferguson; but that’s what Judy would be, in course of time.”

Julia took Mrs. Ferguson’s letter herself to her Aunt Margaret, showing many signs of perturbation in her usually tranquil face.

Mrs. Carey read it through carefully.  “It is a very kind, generous offer, Julia.  Your father cannot be consulted about it, so you must decide.  You would have every luxury, and your life would be full of change and pleasure; while with us it must be, in the nature of things, busy and frugal for a long time to come.”

“But I am one more to feed and clothe, Aunt Margaret, and there is so little money!”

“I know, but you are one more to help, after all.  The days are soon coming when Nancy and Gilbert will be out in the world, helping themselves.  You and Kathleen could stay with Peter and me, awaiting your turn.  It doesn’t look attractive in comparison with what the Fergusons offer you!”

Then the gentle little rivers that had been swelling all the past year in Julia’s heart, rivers of tenderness and gratitude and sympathy, suddenly overflowed their banks and, running hither and thither, softened everything with which they came in contact.  Rocky places melted, barren spots waked into life, and under the impulse of a new mood that she scarcely understood Julia cried, “Oh! dear Aunt Margaret, keep me, keep me!  This is home; I never want to leave it!  I want to be one of Mother Carey’s chickens!”

The child had flung herself into the arms that never failed anybody, and with tears streaming down her cheeks made her plea.

“There, there, Judy dear; you are one of us, and we could not let you go unless you were to gain something by it.  If you really want to stay we shall love you all the better, and you will belong to us more than you ever did; so dry your eyes, or you will be somebody’s duckling instead of my chicken!”

The next surprise was a visit from Cousin Ann Chadwick, who drove up to the door one morning quite unannounced, and asked the driver of the depot wagon to bring over her two trunks immediately.

“Two trunks!” groaned Gilbert.  “That means the whole season!”