Page:Ballinger Price--The Happy Venture.djvu/118

102 orchard, just beginning to sift scented petals over the lesson papers; beginning to be astir with the boom of bees, and the fluttering journeys of those busy householders, the robins. The high, soft grass made the most comfortable of school benches; an upturned box served excellently for a desk; and here Kirk struggled with the elusive, unseen shapes of A. B. C—and conquered them! His first completed manuscript was a letter to his mother, and Phil, looking at it, thought all the toil worth while. The letter had taken long, but Felicia had not helped him with it.

Mrs. Sturgis's feelings, on reading this production, may be imagined. She wept a little, being still not herself, and found heart, for the first time, to notice that a robin was singing outside her own window.