"Children, do keep out of this kitchen."

"Mother, I don't see why it is called the 'cold-pack' process, when you heat the jars," said Peggy.

"Oh, do run along, children; you might go down to Diana's and see how Lady Janet is getting along."

"She is getting quite big," said Alice. "Can we bring her home to-day?"

"Not to-day," said her mother firmly. "I must get this preserving done before she comes."

Picking raspberries was even more delightful than picking strawberries, because they were bigger, and there were so many more of them; but going for blueberries was the best of all, for there were such quant.i.ties of them in the pasture on the hill that one could get quarts and quarts.

Indeed, there were so many that Mrs. Owen was glad of extra pickers. She proposed having a picnic and asking Miss Rand and Clara, and Diana and her brothers. Diana was much stronger now, and her father was going to take her to the picnic in his automobile. Mrs. Carter decided she would like to go, too, and so did her brother, who was staying with them for a few days. Diana thought that, next to her father, there was no other man in the whole world so delightful as her Uncle Joe. He was tall and slim and had friendly brown eyes, and such a kind face and merry smile that Peggy and Alice and Clara liked him the first moment they saw him.

The first moment had been the day Clara went for her kitten. He had put the struggling Topsy into the basket in such a nice way, and he talked to her as if she had been a person. "Topsy, you are going to a very good home," he said. "Miss Rand is one who understands people like you, and so does Clara. You will have the choicest food--lamb and fish, and all that you most desire, and you will be so well fed you will not have to live, like the Chinese, on mice."

Lady Janet was still living at the Carters' on account of the preserving, but she was getting so big she was to come to them very soon.

"If we wait until she gets much bigger, she will be running home just as her mother did," said Peggy.

The day of the picnic was a glorious one. Peggy called it a "blue day"

because the sky was so blue. It was a deep blue, and there were great fleecy clouds floating about. The blueberries were the most wonderful blue, two shades, dark and light, with a shimmer to them, and Peggy's blue frock seemed a part of all the brightness of the day. Alice had on her yellow frock, and Diana was in green, and Clara in pink. It was almost too beautiful a day for them to stop and pick berries, Peggy thought; but that was what they had come for. Mrs. Owen said she would give a pint of preserved blueberries to the boy or girl who picked the first quart, provided they were carefully picked. So every one set to work to pick with a will.

Tom got his pail filled first, but as he was older than the other children, Diana said she thought Peggy ought to have the prize, because she had filled her quart pail almost as soon as Tom had; for Peggy, who was naturally quick, had been so anxious to come out ahead that she had not stopped to look at squirrels and birds. When Mrs. Owen examined the berries, however, she found some that were not ripe in Peggy's pail.

Diana and Alice had both of them picked slowly, but carefully.

Christopher had almost as many as Peggy, but his had to be gone over, and some unripe ones taken out. Clara had the fewest and poorest of all.

She was not used to applying herself, and very soon she said she was tired and that the sun made her head ache; so Miss Rand said she could go into the little hut and rest. But this did not suit her, for she liked to be with the other children.

"I am going to give the prize to Diana," said Mrs. Owen, "as Tom won't take it, for she has picked carefully."

"Let's see who has picked the most," said Peggy, as she examined the pails. "Oh, mother has a lot more than anybody. Mother, you'll have to keep some for yourself, and Alice and I can help you eat them."

Miss Rand had a great many, and so had Mrs. Carter, but her brother Joe had the fewest of all the grown people, for he had been building a fire in the hut, so that Mrs. Owen could fry bacon and heat cocoa for dinner.

When they all took a recess in picking and sat down on the piazza of the camp for their dinner, Peggy thought she had never tasted anything so good in her life as the bread and b.u.t.ter and hard-boiled eggs and crisp bacon. For dessert they had saucers of blueberries and cups of cocoa, and some cake and doughnuts, which Mrs. Carter and Mrs. Horton had contributed to the feast.

As they were resting after dinner, Mrs. Carter read a story aloud to them. Then they all picked blueberries again. Diana and Clara soon got tired, and Miss Rand fixed a comfortable place for them to lie down on the window-seats in the hut. Mrs. Owen took some gray blankets out of one of the lockers and covered them up carefully.

At night, when Dr. Carter came for them with the automobile, they had the large pails Mrs. Owen had brought filled with blueberries as well as the quart pails. Peggy had never seen so many blueberries together in her life. The automobile had seats for seven. There were four grown people at the picnic, and Dr. Carter made five. And there were six children.

"I'll come back for a second load," Dr. Carter said.

"I'd rather walk," said their Uncle Joe, "and I am sure the boys would."

"We'll go down by the short cut," said Tom.

"All right. I can stow the rest of you in."

The three ladies got in on the back seat, Diana was in front with her father, and Alice and Clara were in the side seats.

"Peggy, we can make room for you in front," said Dr. Carter.

But Peggy had no idea of missing that walk down the hill with the boys and their Uncle Joe. "I'd rather walk," she said.

"Jump in, Peggy," said her mother, "you must be very tired."

"I'm not a bit tired, truly I'm not, mother. I've been so tied down all day picking berries, I'm just crazy for a run."

"Let the young colt have a scamper," said Dr. Carter; "it will do her good."

As Peggy danced along down the hillside, she thought how fortunate Diana was to have a father and an uncle and two brothers. She raced down the hill with Christopher while Tom and his uncle followed at their heels.

"There, I have beaten you, Christopher," said Peggy, breathlessly, as she sank down on a rock at the bottom of the hill.

"I could have beaten you if I had tried," said Christopher.

"Then why didn't you?"

"Well, I thought, as you were a girl and younger, I'd let you get a start, and I expected to pa.s.s you."

"Oh, dear, I am tired of being a girl. Just let's play I'm a boy. You can call me Peter."

"I don't want to play you are a boy. I like you better the way you are,"

Christopher said, as he glanced at her blue frock.

"Yes, Peggy," said Uncle Joe, "we all like you better the way you are."

"Well, I suppose I'll have to be a girl and make the best of it. But I do wish I had men and boys in my family."

"You might adopt us," said Uncle Joe. "I would like you and Alice for nieces. A lot of children I'm no relation to call me 'Uncle Joe,' and I'm sure the boys would like you and Alice for cousins."

"You bet we would," said Christopher.

So Peggy came back from the picnic a much richer little girl than she had been when she went to it. "Alice," she said, as she burst into the house, "Mr. Beal says we can call him 'Uncle Joe,' and we can play that Tom and Christopher are our cousins."

"I'd like to call him 'Uncle Joe,'" said Alice, "for he was so nice about Topsy, but I don't want the boys for my cousins."

CHAPTER XI

THE GEOGRAPHY GAME

The children's Uncle Joe was an architect. He was making some additions to Mrs. Horton's house, and so he came up every little while to see how the work was getting on; and later, he was given the new Savings Bank to build. He often came on from New York for a few days and stayed with the Carters. All the children were delighted when he came, for he was just as nice as a child to play with. In fact, he was nicer, for he knew so much more. He was a great traveler, for he had been a Lieutenant in the army and had been across seas. He had traveled, also, in the United States, and there was hardly a State he had not stayed in. The children were never tired of hearing his stories about places and people. He had, too, a delightful way of inventing games, making them up out of his own head.

One rainy October afternoon, Alice and Peggy were sitting in the living-room when the telephone rang. Alice had Lady Janet curled up in her arms, and Peggy was reading aloud from "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland." Peggy flung down her book and ran to the telephone.

"Oh, Peggy," said Diana's plaintive voice, "it is so wet I have had to stay in all day; can't you and Alice come and play with me?"