Phoebe was intent on pinning up the débutante's habit skirt to a
comfortable scramble length. Billy Bob fairly bubbled over with glee and
Milly, who had come to assist Mrs. Matilda in overlooking the
preparations for the feast for the returned hunters, was already busy
assembling hampers and cases on a flat rock over behind the largest fire.
Her anxious heart was at rest about her nestlings, for Caroline's maid,
Annette, had gone French mad over the babies and had begged the privilege
of keeping Mammy Betty company in her watch beside the cots.

"Come here, Caroline, child," called David from behind the farthest fire,
"let me look at you! Seems to me you are in for a good freezing." And he
drew her into the light of the blaze.

She was kilted and booted and coated and belted in the most beautiful and
wholly correct attire for the hunt that could possibly have been
contrived; that is, for a sedate cross-country bird stalk or a decorous
trap shooting, but for a long night scramble over the frozen ground she
was insufficiently clad. The other girls all wore heavy golf skirts and
coats and were muffled to their eyes; even the big-bug lady wore a
knitted comforter high round her throat. Without doubt Caroline would
have been in for a cold deal, if David had not been more than equal to
any occasion.

"Here, Andy, skin out of that sweater and get into that extra buckskin in
my electric," he said, and forthwith began without ceremony to assist
Andrew Sevier in peeling off a soft, white, high-collared sweater he
wore, and in less time than it took to think it he had slipped it over
Caroline's protesting head, pulled it down around her slim hips almost to
where her kilts met her boots and rolled the collar up under her eyes.
Then he immediately turned his attention to the arrival of the mongrel