She hurried on toward the kitchen and in a few moments the children heard her laughing with Molly.

“I think Brownie is hungry,” insisted Sister.  “Aren’t you ever going to feed him?”

“Of course he’s hungry,” chimed in Grace, who had overheard.  “There’s a bowl of bread and milk Mother fixed for him before breakfast, out on the back porch, with a plate over it to keep the cats out.  Take him out there and feed him, Brother.”

Brownie was indeed very hungry and the children enjoyed watching him eat the bread and milk Mother Morrison had fixed for him.  After he had eaten it all up, they took him out on the grass to play, but that fat little brown puppy, instead of playing with them, curled up and went to sleep.

“Never mind—­here comes the party!” cried Sister, whose bright eyes had spied a wagon turning into the drive.

CHAPTER VIII

THE PARTY

“The party” happened to be the ice-cream, and Brother and Sister watched eagerly as the delivery boy carried the heavy wooden tub in which the cream was packed, up the back steps.

“Going to have a party?” he smiled at them as he came back to his wagon.  “Have a good time!”

The pretty little notes of invitation, which Mother Morrison had written to six boys and six girls, friends of Brother’s and Sister’s, two weeks ago, had said from “four to six,” so it was time to dress in the best white clothes soon after lunch.  Indeed, Brother’s collar bow was not tied before the doorbell rang, and Nellie Yarrow arrived.

“I suppose she lived so far away, she thought she might be late,” said Louise.

She ran downstairs and showed Nellie where to put the present she had brought for Brother.

After that the other boys and girls came, one by one, and Brother soon had a little pile of presents on the living-room table.  He opened each one, and said thank you to the child who had brought it, and he forgot to be shy, so that he really enjoyed it all very much.

Charlie Raynor and his sister, Winifred, were the last to come, and Winifred was excited over something.

“I had the most awful time with Charlie!” she announced earnestly, to sympathetic Mother Morrison.  “He acted dreadful!”

Winifred was two years older than Charlie and felt responsible for him.

“Give Roddy his present now,” Winifred urged Charlie.  “Hurry, I tell you.”

Silently Charlie held out a little paper bag of candy.

“I had all I could do to keep him from eating it on the way here,” his sister explained.  “He just loves candy!”

Brother took the bag of candy and put it with his other gifts on the table.  Then the children began the peanut hunt, which was the first game Louise and Grace had planned for them.

This was played outdoors, and it was fully half an hour before all the peanuts had been discovered.  Then, as several of the girls wanted to start the old, old game of “Going to Jerusalem,” and Grace offered to play the music, they all trooped back to the living-room.