"Oh," said Juliet, wistfully, "do you think she would take me--and make
me into a lady?"

"I think she'll take you," he responded, after a brief struggle with
himself, "but I don't want you made over. I want you to stay just
exactly as you are. Oh, you dear little kid," he muttered, "you'll try
to care, won't you?"

"I'll try," she promised, sweetly, as she climbed into the big red
machine. "I didn't think I'd ever be in this car."

"You can come whenever you like. It's mine, now."

Juliet did not seem to hear. The car hummed along the dusty road, making
a soothing, purring noise. Pensively she looked across the distant
fields, whence came the hum and whir of reaping. There was a far-away
look in her face that the man beside her was powerless to understand.
She was making swift readjustments as best she might, and, wisely, he
left her to herself.

As they approached Madame Bernard's, Juliet turned to him. "I was just
thinking," she sighed, "how quickly you grow up after you get to be
twenty-one."

He made no answer. He swallowed hard and turned the car into the
driveway. Aunt Francesca came out on the veranda, followed by Mr.
Boffin, as Juliet jumped out of the car. She had the crumpled note in
her cold little hand.

Without a word, she offered it to Madame Bernard and waited. The