"I'm agoing to ask Aunt Ada if we may go barefoot," announced Molly; "it is plenty warm enough to-day."
Mary jumped up, tipping over her rocking-chair as she did so. "Oh, does she allow you to do that?" she cried. "I've always secretly longed to, but Miss Sharp is perfectly horrified when we ask her."
The other two looked at each other with a little smile, for it was not such a great while before this that Mary herself had been horrified at the suggestion.
"Aunt Ada doesn't care, if it is warm enough," Molly informed her. "I always go barefoot up here, if I feel like it and it isn't too cold. I'll go ask her now. Watch the baby for me, girls."
They promised to be faithful nurses while Molly went on her errand. She was gone some time and when she returned she was carefully bearing a plate of fresh doughnuts. "Which would you rather have, Polly," she cried, "doughnuts or chewing-gum? you can't have both, Aunt Ada says."
"Doughnuts," decided Polly without hesitation taking the chewing-gum from her mouth and slapping it securely against a stone in the foundation of the porch. "Don't they look good? So brown and sugary. I do think Luella makes the best doughnuts," and she helped herself to a specially fat, appetizing one.
"Which do you choose, Mary?" asked Molly.
Mary continued her rocking and chewing. "I'll keep the gum, thank you."
Molly laughed. "That is what Aunt Ada said you would do. And girls, we may take off our shoes and stockings. How's the baby, Polly?"
"Good! Then I reckon we can leave her for a while, I do want to get my bare toes on the grass, don't you? Come on, Polly, and let's hunt for snakes."
"Snakes!" Mary jumped to her feet in horror. "Are there snakes here? Fancy!" She gathered her skirts about her and looked ready to fly.
"Why, yes. Do you mind them?" returned Molly calmly. "Polly and I love the little green grass snakes; they are perfectly harmless and are so pretty."
"Pretty? I could never imagine anything pretty about a snake," replied Mary, recoiling.
"My word! Molly, just fancy your talking so of a horrid snake."
Molly laughed at her horror. "They aren't poisonous, Mary."
"But the very idea of them is so loathsome."
"It isn't unless you make it so," put in Polly. "I like all kinds of little creatures so long as they don't bite or sting, and some of those, like bees, for example, I like, though I don't want them to get too near me. Of course when it comes to rattlesnakes or copperheads, or such, I am afraid of them, but these little grass snakes are different."