CHAPTER IX

THE CREST OF THE WAVE

The rain could not last forever; Nature must cease weeping some time.
Just as girls, far away from their old homes and their old friends,
must cease wetting their pillows with regretful tears after a time,
and look forward to the new interests and new friends to which they
have come.

Not that Ruth wept much. But the rainy days of that first week were
necessarily trying. On Saturday, however, came a clear day. The sun
shone, the drenched trees shook themselves, and the wind came and blew
softly and warmly through their branches to dry the tender foliage.
The birds popped out of their hiding-places and began to sing and
chirp as though they never could be glad enough for this change in the
weather.

There was so much to see from the kitchen door at the Red Mill that
Ruth did not mind her work that morning. She had learned now to help
Aunt Alvirah in many ways. Not often did the old lady have to go about
moaning her old refrain:

"Oh, my back and oh, my bones! Oh, my back and oh, my bones!"

The housework was all done and the kitchen swept and as neat as a new
pin when the gay tooting of the Cameron automobile horn called Ruth to
the porch. There was only Helen on the front seat of the car; but in
the tonneau was a bundled-up figure surmounted by what looked to be a