“Why, that’s ours,” said Frank, jumping from the table.  “Don’t you want to go and look at it?”

They said of course they did, and Mark said he would go too.  They were perfectly delighted with the new house and everything in it, and praised it for being so tiny and cosey and comfortable, until Frank thought he had never felt so happy and proud before.  It was no wonder, for this was the first time he had ever known the pleasure of extending, to those whom he loved, the hospitality of a pleasant home of his own.

When they returned to the big house they found the rest of their friends from the schooner there.  Captain May started when he saw Frank March, and on being introduced to him held his hand so long, and stared at him so earnestly, as to greatly embarrass the boy.

As Uncle Christopher and the Aroostook gentlemen were anxious to visit the mill, Mr. Elmer invited them to walk up there through the woods.  On their way they passed the sulphur spring, which had been cleaned out and walled in, and over which a neat bath-house had been built.  Uncle Christopher was delighted with it, and declared that, to an old “rheumatizy” man like him, that spring was worth all the lumber in “Floridy.”

Mark had asked Edna and Ruth to go up to the mill by water with Frank and him in the canoe, and they accepted the invitation.  At first Edna was very timid in the frail craft, but she soon gained confidence, and said “she thought it was the very nicest little boat, on one of the prettiest rivers she had ever seen.”

As they neared the mill its busy machinery seemed to Mark to say, “Welcome, Mr. President, welcome, Mr. President, welcome Mr. President of the Elmer Mills”; and when he drew the attention of the others to it, they declared that they, too, could distinguish the words quite plainly.  The mill looked just as it had when they last saw it, but at one side were great piles of sawed lumber that Uncle Christopher and the Aroostook gentlemen were examining carefully.

That afternoon Mark handed Frank thirty dollars as his share of the money the former had received from their otter-skins, which he had carried North and sold.  Frank had several more that he had caught during the summer, but their skins were of little value compared with those caught during the earlier months of the year.

Mr. Elmer had invited all the gentlemen to dine with him that evening, much to the consternation of Aunt Chloe, who said “she was sho’ she couldn’t see how she was gwine fin’ time to po’wide vittles fo’ so many guesses; an’ dem po’ hung’y Norfeners too.  ‘Specs dey’ll be powerful tickled to git a squar’ meal.”

The “guesses” spent the afternoon in crossing the river to Wakulla, and in driving several miles into the great pine forests, which pleased them greatly.