“Certainly she may; and she may have married and had a dozen children.  You see, until we can find out something about this Emily we can’t give a clear title to the land.”

Mrs. Smith nodded her understanding.

“It’s lucky we’ve never been willing to sell any of the old estate,” said Mr. William Clark, who had entered and been listening to the story.  “If we had we should, quite ignorantly, have given a defective title.”

“Isn’t it possible, after making as long and thorough a search as you can, to take the case into court and have the judge declare the title you give to be valid, under the circumstances?”

“That is done; but you can see that such a decision would be granted only after long research on our part.  It would delay your purchase considerably.”

“However, it seems to me the thing to do,” decided Mrs. Smith, and she and Stanley at once entered upon a discussion of the ways and means by which the hunt for Emily Leonard and her heirs was to be accomplished.  It included the employment of detectives for the spring months, and then, if they had not met with success, a journey by Stanley during the weeks of his summer vacation.

Dorothy and Ethel were bitterly disappointed at the result of Mrs. Smith’s attempt to purchase the coveted bit of land.

“I suppose it wouldn’t have any value for any one else on earth,” cried Dorothy, “but I want it.”

“I don’t think I ever saw a spot that suited me so well for a summer play place,” agreed Ethel Blue, and Helen and Roger and all the rest of the Club members were of the same opinion.

“The Clarks will be putting the price up if they should find out that we wanted it so much,” warned Roger.

“I don’t believe they would,” smiled Mrs. Smith.  “They said they thought themselves lucky to have a customer for it, because it isn’t good for building ground.”

“We’ll hope that Stanley will unearth the history of his great-aunt,” said Roger seriously.

“And find that she died a spinster,” smiled his Aunt Louise.  “The fewer heirs there are to deal the simpler it will be.”

CHAPTER VI

WILD FLOWERS FOR HELEN’S GARDEN

Roger had a fair crop of lettuce in one of his flats by the middle of March and transplanted the tiny, vivid green leaves to the hotbed without doing them any harm.  The celery and tomato seeds that he had planted during the first week of the month were showing their heads bravely and the cabbage and cauliflower seedlings had gone to keep the lettuce company in the hotbed.  On every warm day he opened the sashes and let the air circulate among the young plants.

“Wordsworth says

    ’It is my faith that every flower
    Enjoys the air it breathes,’

and I suppose that’s true of vegetables, too,” laughed Roger.

The girls, meanwhile, had been planting the seeds of Canterbury bells and foxgloves in flats.  They did not put in many of them because they learned that they would not blossom until the second year.  The flats they made from boxes that had held tomato cans.  Roger sawed through the sides and they used the cover for the bottom of the second flat.