“I don’t see why he shouldn’t sell them.  Green cats ought to sell quickly enough, I should think.  Were they green, honest and truly, Jed?”

Mr. Winslow nodded.

“They were that mornin’,” he drawled, solemnly.

“That morning?  What do you mean?”

“We-ll, you see, Maud, those kittens were into everything and over everything most of the time.  Four of ’em had got in here early afore I came downstairs that day and had been playin’ hide and hoot amongst my paint pots.  They was green in spots, sure enough, but I had my doubts as to its bein’ fast color.”

Maud laughed joyfully over the secret of the green pussies.

“I wish I might have seen that woman’s face after the colors began to wear off her ‘rare’ kitten,” she said.

Jed smiled slightly.  “Nathan saw it,” he said.  “I understood he had to take back the kitten and give up the seven dollars.  He don’t hardly speak to me nowadays.  Seems to think ’twas my fault.  I don’t hardly think ’twas, do you?”

Miss Hunniwell’s call lasted almost an hour.  Besides a general chat concerning Leander Babbit’s voluntary enlistment, the subject which all Orham had discussed since the previous afternoon, she had a fresh bit of news.  The government had leased a large section of land along the bay at East Harniss, the next village to Orham and seven or eight miles distant, and there was to be a military aviation camp there.

“Oh, it’s true!” she declared, emphatically.  “Father has known that the Army people have been thinking of it for some time, but it was really decided and the leases signed only last Saturday.  They will begin building the barracks and the buildings—­the—­oh, what do they call those big sheds they keep the aeroplanes in?”

“The hangars,” said Winslow, promptly.

“Yes, that’s it.  They will begin building those right away.”  She paused and looked at him curiously.  “How did you know they called them hangars, Jed?” she asked.

“Eh? . . .  Oh, I’ve read about ’em in the newspapers, that’s all. . . .  H-u-u-m. . . .  So we’ll have aeroplanes flyin’ around here pretty soon, I suppose.  Well, well!”

“Yes.  And there’ll be lots and lots of the flying men—­the what-do-you-call-’ems—­aviators, and officers in uniform—­and all sorts.  What fun!  I’m just crazy about uniforms!”

Her eyes snapped.  Jed, in his quiet way, seemed excited, too.  He was gazing absently out of the window as if he saw, in fancy, a procession of aircraft flying over Orham flats.

“They’ll be flyin’ up out there,” he said, musingly.  “And I’ll see ’em—­I will.  Sho!”

Miss Hunniwell regarded him mischievously.  “Jed,” she asked, “would you like to be an aviator?”

Jed’s answer was solemnly given.  “I’m afraid I shouldn’t be much good at the job,” he drawled.

His visitor burst into another laugh.  He looked at her over his glasses.