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Hilda was gone to the house quite a while. Missou’ had been hard to persuade, and didn’t want to let her have the little cakes. When she came back she found Maybelle curiously excited, while the two boys stood back, Clarke Capadine looking rather scared, Fayte grinning.

“Will you boys come to our party?” she asked doubtfully, taking stock of what Missou’ had finally given her, wondering whether it would be enough.

Clarke muttered and looked down, but Fayte grinned more than ever.

“Sure. Let’s make it a funeral—if there’s scraps enough to bury. The firing squad’s been here while you were gone.”

And then she saw the scattered bits of china sprinkled over the play-house, the rifle in his hand.

Hilda didn’t know for a minute quite who it was that screamed. Something that was not herself seemed to come up in her throat and issue from her mouth in a volume of sound that scared the children and brought the men running from the porch. Quickly as they came, Uncle Hank was quicker. He had jumped away from the pony he was just about mounting over at the corral, and run across the lawn; Hilda was in his arms when her father and Mr. Capadine arrived.