It was quite late when they reached the ranch, and an anxious crowd was awaiting them on the veranda. Blue Bonnet wished there were rather fewer people there; it was tiresome to make explanations before such an audience. Besides, she did not know the visitor's name,—introductions had been of a rather sketchy sort that day. Suddenly she made up her mind: she would explain nothing just then, and trust to her grandmother's ready tact to understand her reasons.

"This is—" Blue Bonnet looked at the youth inquiringly.

"—Knight Judson," he supplied.

"—and he's met with an accident and will stay here till his arm is better," she said rather breathlessly to her uncle.

"Very glad to have you, I'm sure," said Uncle Cliff with ready, outstretched hand.

Knight Judson took the proffered hand with an air of relief. "You're very kind, sir," he stammered.

"Not at all," Mr. Ashe protested cordially. "Come right in to supper."

They all went in without further ceremony to the delayed supper which Juanita stood waiting to serve; and the meal progressed in the usual gay fashion that prevailed at the ranch. Knight Judson was placed between Alec and Uncle Cliff, and in that congenial company the youth lost his shyness and was soon chatting away like an old friend. The awkwardness of eating with one hand gave him occasional bad moments, but little services, rendered unobserved by his attentive neighbors, tided over even these trying times.

The girls stole occasional glances down to that end of the table, which were promptly frowned upon by Blue Bonnet and Sarah. On the whole, they acted rather well considering the strain on their curiosity; it was not every day that a good-looking young chap, wearing a bright red sash for a sling, appeared at the ranch.

It was not until after supper, when Alec had taken the visitor to his room, that the others heard the whole story of the day's adventure. Sarah and Blue Bonnet told it almost together, a rather incoherent but wholly thrilling tale, while the rest of the girls hung breathlessly on the recital. Mrs. Clyde look worried when Sarah dwelt on the peril that had threatened the two of them; Blue Bonnet wished Sarah had not found it necessary to enlarge on that part of it. She, herself, preferred to describe young Judson's skill and quickness, his wonderful daring, and heroism under pain.

"Judson, Judson," repeated Sarah, wrinkling up her brow. "Where have I heard that name before?"

Blue Bonnet thought deeply for a moment. "I know," she cried; "don't you remember Carita, Carita Judson,—my missionary girl!"

"I wonder if they're related!" exclaimed Sarah. "She lives in Texas, you know."

"We must ask him in the morning," said Blue Bonnet.

Early the next day Mr. Ashe despatched one of the Mexicans with a letter from Knight Judson to his uncle at the Big Spring.

"Tell him not to expect you until he sees you," Mr. Ashe admonished the youth. "You must stay until that wrist is perfectly well."

"You're very good, sir," replied Knight warmly. He was not at all averse to spending any length of time in this pleasant place; he and Alec had fraternized at once, and he welcomed the chance to know the bright Eastern boy better; as for the girls, there were too many of them, he thought.

At breakfast Blue Bonnet opened fire on him.

"Carita!" he exclaimed. "Am I any relation to her? Well, I guess yes—she's my cousin! Do you know her?"

"I don't exactly know her," Blue Bonnet confessed, "—but we have—corresponded." She stopped abruptly; it was impossible to tell Knight about the missionary box; he might feel sensitive about it. Happily Sarah came to the rescue.

"Father knows the Reverend Mr. Judson," she remarked. "Is he your uncle?"

"Yes,—and Carita's father," he explained. "You see, Uncle Bayard has charge of a summer camp for boys up at the Big Spring; he has had it for several years,—we have wonderful times there. A few days ago I had a letter from my cousin George in Chicago asking me to look up his friend Abbott, who had been ordered to Texas for his health. Abbott was at the Spring with us last summer, but it didn't agree with him, so he came to Kooch's. I was on my way there when—"

"When!" exclaimed Kitty dramatically. "We've heard what happened. We ought to have known better than to let a tenderfoot like Blue Bonnet go off with no protector but Sarah."

"It wasn't Blue Bonnet's fault," protested Sarah indignantly. "I was driving."

"And I suppose you drive as scientifically as you swim?" mocked Kitty.

Knight looked up with twinkling eyes; evidently the We are Sevens were not all of Sarah's type. Blue Bonnet he had already put in a class by herself.

"Please tell us some more about the boys' camp," begged Blue Bonnet, "I've heard about the Big Spring, and Uncle has promised to take me there. But, somehow, he never seems to get time. Is it a camp just for boys?—it sounds so interesting."

"It's one of Uncle's fads," Knight returned, showing by his tone that he was rather proud of "Uncle's fad." "He's tremendously interested in boys and has started a sort of 'get together' movement for fellows who live on big ranches and farms and don't get a chance to see much of other young people—"

"Like me!" Blue Bonnet nodded.

"They club in on expenses, share the work, and, incidentally, have more fun than some of them ever had before," he continued. "Uncle isn't at all strong—that's why he came back from his mission—but he works hard all the time, always doing good—" he stopped abruptly. "I didn't mean to brag, but when I get started on Uncle Bayard, I never know when to stop."

"And Carita—does she go camping, too?" asked Blue Bonnet.

"Aunt Cynthy often brings the whole family for over Sunday," he replied. Then a thought seemed to strike him. "Why don't you all come up and camp—it isn't a hard trip?"

Blue Bonnet clapped her hands. "Oh, I think it would be perfectly lovely. Grandmother, may we?" she asked.

Mrs. Clyde looked up with her sympathetic smile. "It sounds attractive. Perhaps we can arrange it."

Without seeming to do so Grandmother had heard every word of the conversation, and her heart had warmed to the boy who spoke so glowingly of his uncle's work. Knight Judson was a manly young fellow, she concluded, the right sort to be among girls; the best of companions for the frail, bookish Eastern lad.

Alec himself was charmed with Knight. There was something fascinating about a boy who had spent most of his life in the open, and without much aid from books had yet thought more deeply than most youths of his age. He was tall and strong, all bone and muscle, with something about him that was suggestive of a restless colt; but a thoroughbred, every inch of him.

After breakfast the two boys set out to hunt for Knight's horse, as nothing had been seen or heard of that frisky pony since he had vanished so unceremoniously the evening before. Alec carried a lariat, for learning to lasso had become the absorbing passion of his life, and young Judson, in spite of the hampering folds of the sling about his left arm, could give lessons in that art to any boy of his age in Texas.

Blue Bonnet and Mrs. Clyde looked after the youthful pair with interested eyes. It was plain that Knight had brought a new element into Alec's life, and these two good friends rejoiced, though they said nothing and only smiled with new understanding.

"I'm glad we nearly tipped over!" Blue Bonnet suddenly declared.

"Blue Bonnet!" exclaimed her grandmother in a pained tone.

"Well, I reckon I didn't mean that," confessed Blue Bonnet after a moment's reflection. "But I'm glad we've met Knight Judson. Alec has had too many girls around him here. He needs a spell of roughing it," and then, as she saw an odd look on her grandmother's face, she asked quickly: "Isn't 'roughing it' in good society?"

Mrs. Clyde laughed. "I believe it moves in the best circles—here."

"That's good, for there isn't a Massachusetts word that could possibly take its place."

"The dining-table is cleared, Benita says," Sarah announced from the doorway, "and we can begin our sewing lesson."

They all repaired to the house, and a few minutes later the big dining-room was the scene of great activity; the table strewn with the bright-hued pieces of material, Benita smoothing and pinning the patterns, the SeÑora superintending, and the girls cutting and snipping to their hearts' content. At the same time there went on an incessant chatter, chatter, to the cheerful accompaniment of the sewing-machine.

When Juanita entered to spread the cloth for their early dinner, the girls looked up in surprise.

"I never knew time fly so quickly before," said Debby.

"If I'd known this kind of sewing was so easy and so fascinating," Blue Bonnet declared, "I'd have taken it up before. It's much nicer than embroidery or mending. Just see how much I've done!" She proudly held up the bright red garment.

Sarah scanned it with perplexed eyes. "It looks rather queer to me," she said.

Kitty examined it, too, then snatched the suit from Blue Bonnet's hands. "Look!" she bade the rest, "—there's no place to get into it. Blue Bonnet has sewn it up the back!"

There was a great outcry at this, which had the unexpected effect of making Blue Bonnet angry.

"There's nothing on earth gives Kitty Clark such pleasure as finding me out in a mistake," she declared with flashing eyes and cheeks that burned with mortification. Then she turned on Kitty,—"I'm sorry the ranch can't offer you any other enjoyment!" she said scathingly and then, snatching back her ridiculed work, flung herself out of the room.

Kitty's cheeks turned as red as her hair and she was just framing an angry reply to hurl after Blue Bonnet when she met Mrs. Clyde's eyes, full of a pained surprise. The girl checked the words on her lips at once, but a few hot tears came in spite of her efforts.

"I was only joking," she said with a catch in her voice.

"I'm afraid it was my fault," said Sarah. "I shouldn't have called attention to her mistake. I'll go and apologize."

Kitty turned to Mrs. Clyde. "I apologize to you, SeÑora," she said, adding proudly, "but I've nothing to apologize for to Blue Bonnet. Half the fun of being a We are Seven is being able to say just what we want to. If everybody is suddenly going to be thin-skinned, I'll have to go about muzzled."

"Blue Bonnet was hasty," said Mrs. Clyde, "and I'm sure she'll be ready to apologize as soon as she has thought it over."

The sewing lesson for that day ended in a gloomy silence. At dinner the two "magpies," as Uncle Joe had nicknamed them, were mute. This unheard of state of affairs would have aroused comment at any other time, but just now their attention was diverted.

"Doctor" Abbott, who had ridden over to "take a look at Knight's wrist," had stayed to dinner—there being always room for one more at that elastic table—and his bright humorous talk had completely fascinated every one. After dinner the men went off for a smoke, and the girls retired for their siesta in an atmosphere as hazy as if they too had indulged in the fragrant weed.

They went to the swimming hole later in the day, but somehow the zest was all gone from the sport, with the two leading spirits distrait and moody, avoiding direct speech with each other, and preserving an attitude of injured pride. Blue Bonnet had made up her mind that Kitty owed her an apology, while Kitty obstinately refused even in her thoughts to acknowledge herself in the wrong.

"Blue Bonnet thinks she's the king-pin of the universe," she mused angrily. "The others can keep on spoiling her if they want to, but I'm not going to kowtow all the time. They ape her every action,—I'll show her that one of us has independence."

Keyed up by this formula, repeated mentally a great many times, Kitty began to indulge in heroics. Aching to excite some admiration for herself she did "stunts" in the water that would have terrified her the day before. Once she plunged her bright head under the water and kept it there until she was almost black in the face, in an effort to prove her "staying powers." It only frightened the other girls and went apparently unnoticed by Blue Bonnet for whose benefit the test had been made.

"I'll show her we're not all 'fraid-cats!" Kitty resolved passionately. "I believe," she announced to the girls, in a tone loud enough to reach Blue Bonnet, who was doing an overhand stroke in the quiet water of the opposite bank. "I believe the only way to learn to swim is to dive in head-first—then you just have to. Big boys always toss little fellows into the middle of the pool and make 'em scramble back—they always do it right off. Here goes!"

She poised only for a moment on the bank, not daring to give herself time to reconsider. Blue Bonnet shot a quick glance at her; she saw at once that Kitty had chosen too shallow a spot,—a dive at that point might be dangerous. At any other time she would have shouted a hasty warning, but now she hesitated,—and in that second Kitty shot head-first into the water.

The girls gave a gasp, and kept their eyes on the spot where she had gone down, waiting to see the red locks reappear. But the water closed over Kitty,—and stayed closed.

"Blue Bonnet!" they shouted shrilly, "she hasn't come up!"

Blue Bonnet felt a queer tightening around her heart; she had heard of boys breaking their necks that way. With a few powerful strokes she reached the shallows and felt for Kitty. "Help me girls—quick!" she cried, "she's struck her head on the bottom." She had seized Kitty by this time and held the girl's head above the water, but the body hung limp and heavy in her arms. The girls sprang to help and among them they managed to lift the slight figure to the bank and lay it tenderly on the soft grass. Kitty's face was deathly white, and from a gash on the top of her head a trickling stream was dyeing her bright locks a deeper red.

Blue Bonnet's teeth were chattering. "Go for somebody!" she gasped, and then, as Debby started on the run, she called after her—"That young doctor—bring him!" Then she turned to Sarah: "Here, help me set her up—work her arms—so!"

Dripping as she fled like a frightened water-sprite, Debby burst upon the others as they sat under the magnolia and screamed tragically:

"Come quick—the doctor, everybody! Kitty dove and Blue Bonnet went down after her and she's drowned!"

Then breathless, exhausted, and with her bare feet cut and bleeding from her run over the rough meadow, she fell headlong at Mrs. Clyde's feet.

Uncle Cliff dropped his pipe and ran, followed by the two boys and Abbott, who paused only to catch up his medicine case from the veranda, and then sped like the wind after the others. Mrs. Clyde had turned ghastly white at Debby's cry and had sprung up to follow the men. But the sight of the little messenger lying in a pathetic heap by her chair, stopped her. Hastily summoning Benita she helped carry Debby into the house and put her to bed; and not until a faint tired moan told of returning consciousness, did she yield to her anxiety and hasten to the pool.

With her feet winged by fear she crossed the meadow, ran as she had not run for forty years, and burst upon the group on the bank with a wild cry—"My girl, my girl—where is she?"

At the sound Blue Bonnet sprang up, and running to her grandmother hugged her convulsively. "She isn't dead—only stunned," the girl sobbed in a glad relief.

Mrs. Clyde held her off for a second. "It wasn't you then?" she questioned as if afraid to trust her eyes.

"No, no!" cried Blue Bonnet.

"Thank God!" breathed her grandmother. Then she folded the girl, wet as she was, in her arms, and held her close as if she would never let her go. In that moment Blue Bonnet knew and was never to forget how much she was loved by her mother's mother.

A sound drew them to the group about Kitty.

"There now!" young Abbott was saying cheerfully. "She's all right. Now, Knight, get in some of your good work,—first aid to the injured as taught by the Reverend Bayard Judson. A stretcher is what we need."

Much pleased to be called upon, Knight set about his task, while Alec supplied the place of his disabled arm. Under his directions two stout saplings were cut and the small twigs trimmed from them. Then stripping off his coat he bade Alec thrust the two poles into its sleeve, one in each. Uncle Cliff's coat went on at the other end; both coats were buttoned underneath, and there before the eyes of the interested group, was a stretcher ready for the patient.

Kitty, still weak and dazed, but with the color beginning to return to her milk-white cheeks, was borne gently to the house by Uncle Cliff and the doctor, attended by a body-guard of Alec and Mrs. Clyde, and followed by the other dripping and subdued We are Sevens.

There was a rather bad quarter of an hour for Kitty while the doctor bathed and dressed her wound. After much debating and grave consideration in his most profound manner, young Abbott had decided that the cut was not deep or wide enough to warrant his sewing it up. Whereat there was great rejoicing in the household,—not, however, shared by the medical man. A bit of stitching would have given him practice and no end of professional enjoyment. However, Kitty felt that she had had quite her share of attention and was glad to be left alone in the nursery tucked in between cool sheets, to sleep off the ache in her broken head.

When she awoke it was dusk in the room. Beside her bed stood somebody, bearing a tray.

"Are you awake?" asked a sepulchral voice.

"Yes," she whispered faintly.

The tray was hastily placed on a stand, a second pillow slipped deftly under Kitty's head, and then before she had recognized her servitor a pair of soft lips were laid on hers and a penitent voice whispered: "I'm so sorry, Kitty,—and ashamed!"

"It wasn't your fault, Blue Bonnet," said Kitty, returning the kiss warmly. "Served me right for being such a peacock."

"Then all's serene on the Potomac?" Blue Bonnet questioned.

And with a reassuring, though somewhat shaky smile, Kitty returned:

"All's serene!"