“This is the la-st time we’ll ever ride together,” sighed Joyce, as she mounted Calico after breakfast.  “Oh, it has been such fun, Lloyd, and I’ve enjoyed this little clown pony more than I can ever tell.  He is the dearest, ugliest little beast that ever wore a halter, and I’ll never forget him as long as I live.”

“And this is the last time we can go galloping out of this gate together, and see the boys coming up the road to meet us,” cried Eugenia.  “There they are, all three of them.  Oh, they haven’t heard the news yet!  I’m going to dash on ahead and tell them.”

Eugenia’s news was that she was going abroad with her father in the fall.  It had all been arranged since he came to Locust.  Finding that business required one of the members of his firm to spend a month in England, he telegraphed back to the office that he would go.

“I don’t know which is the most excited over the prospect, myself, or my maid,” said Eugenia to the boys.  “Poor old Eliot is simply wild with delight at the thought of seeing her home and family again, and I am nearly as much upset as she is.  We’re to be gone five or six months.  Papa says that while we are over there we might as well go the rounds, so maybe we’ll spend Christmas in France, in the same place that Joyce did.”

“What time do you leave Locust to-night?” asked Malcolm.

“On the ten o’clock train, I think.  Joyce is going with us, part of the way, as papa has to make a trip to St. Louis before we go back to New York.”

“And which way are you all going now?” asked Keith.  The others had joined them, and the seven ponies were standing in a ring in the middle of the road, their noses almost touching.

“We’re going down to your house,” answered Joyce, “to bid your Grandmother MacIntyre and Miss Allison good-bye.  They have been so good to us all the time we have been here.  Your Aunt Allison has done so much to entertain us, and as for your grandmother, I couldn’t begin to tell you how she cheered us up when we had the measles.  There was something from her every day, fruit and flowers and wine jellies and messages.  One of my sweetest memories of Kentucky will be of your beautiful grandmother.”

Instantly both the boys lifted their hats in acknowledgment, but Keith exclaimed in boyish impatience, “Oh, pshaw!  I thought we were all going over to the mill this morning.  The last time, you know.  There’s no need of your going down to bid them good-bye when we’ll see you at—­”

But Lloyd stopped him with a finger on her lip and a threatening shake of her head.  “Come on!” she cried, starting Tarbaby down the road at full gallop.  “We can’t stand heah in the road all day.”

Keith dashed after her, laying a detaining hand on her bridle when he reached her side.  “What’s the matter, Miss Savage?” he asked.  “What do you mean, by shaking your head at me in that way?”

“Can’t you keep a secret?” she demanded, crossly.  “You know well enough we want to surprise the girls to-night.”