But Ned only laughed, and kept on laughing as his mother appeared in the vestibule with a puzzled look at the empty seat in the tonneau of the Fire Bird.

Dorothy was the first to reach the porch.

“She didn’t come,” was her wholly unnecessary remark as Mrs. White opened the outer door.

“Isn’t that strange!” replied the aunt.  “Do you suppose anything could have happened?”

“I don’t know.  I hope not.  She promised so definitely that I can’t understand it,” went on Dorothy.

Nat remained in the car as Ned drove it to the garage.

“I’m so sorry, after all the extra trouble to get up a good dinner,” apologized Dorothy as she laid aside her wraps.

“Oh, well, we can all enjoy that,” replied Mrs. White, “although, of course, we had counted on Tavia’s presence.  She is so jolly that the boys will be much disappointed.”

“I’m just ashamed of her,” went on Dorothy in a burst of indignation.  “She should have learned by this time to keep her word, or else send some message.”

“Yes, I am afraid Tavia does not care for the conventionalities of polite society,” remarked Mrs. White.  “In fact, I almost suspect she enjoys disregarding them.  But never mind! we must not condemn her unheard.”

CHAPTER II

WHAT HAPPENED TO TAVIA

It must not be understood that Nat was a very silly boy.  Not at all.  He did like Tavia, but he liked his own sweet cousin Dorothy, and would have been just as disappointed, if not more so, had it been Dorothy who had missed her train and not Tavia.

But the fact that all seemed to need Tavia to finish up the holiday plans, and that now she had not come put Nat in a very restless mood, and when the dinner, which was served immediately upon the return from the depot, was over, Nat decided he would find something to do that would occupy his time until the eight o’clock train, when, of course, they would again go to the station.

Electricity was this young man’s “hobby,” and he had already fitted up the cellar with all sorts of wires and attachments for regulating the household affairs, such as turning on the heat by touching a button in the stable where the hired man, John, had his quarters, and lighting the gas in the coal-cellar by touching a button at the cook’s elbow; in fact, Nat really did arrange a number of most convenient contrivances, but the family, all except Joe and Roger, thought his talent misapplied.  They insisted he ought to study “railroading.”

“Or laying pipes,” Ned would tell him when Nat pointed out some improvement in the miniature telephone system.

But Joe and Roger loved to watch their big cousin make the sparks and turn on the signals, the latter task always being assigned to Roger, who had a very small engine of his own to practice on.

“Come on, boys,” said Nat to the youngsters, when, dinner being over, Major Dale and his sister, Mrs. White, went to “figure out Christmas secrets,” and Dorothy turned to the piano to put in her time until the hour for going out again, “come on, and we’ll rig up something.”