PANDORA'S CHEST 369 



chimney and fireplace at one end, before which our 

 beds may be drawn campfire fashion if it is too cool, 

 and adjustable shutters so that it may be either merely 

 a roof or a fairly substantial cabin and at all possible 

 seasons a study and playroom for us all. Then too 

 we shall overlook "Maria Maxwell's Experiment," as 

 Bart calls her scheme of running the Opal Farm. 

 We were heartily glad to know that she had leased 

 and not bought it, but we were much surprised to 

 learn, first through the village paper, and not the man 

 and woman concerned, that "Mr. Ross Blake, the 

 engineer in charge of the construction of the new res- 

 ervoir, believing in the future of the real- estate boom in 

 Woodridge (we didn 't know there was one), has recently 

 purchased the Amos Opie farm as an investment, the 

 deed being to-day recorded in the town house. He has 

 already leased it for a young ladies' seminary, pending 

 its remodelling, for which he himself is drawing the 

 plans." 



Dear Man from Everywhere! much as I like Maria, 

 I think he would be the more restful neighbour of the 

 two. What a complete couple they might have made, 

 but that is a bit of drift thought that I have put out 

 of my head, for if any two people ever had a chance 

 this summer to fall in love if they had the capacity, 



