Page:Ballinger Price--The Happy Venture.djvu/84

70 "It's quite next door to you," said Kirk. "They call it the Baldwin place, really. But Ken happened to think that Baldwin's a kind of apple, and there is an orchard and a gate, so we called it that."

"The old farm-house across the meadow!" There was a shade of perplexity in the voice. "You live there?"

"It's the most beautiful place in the world," said Kirk, with conviction, "except your garden."

"Beautiful—to you! Why?"

"Oh, everything!" Kirk said, frowning, and trying to put into words what was really joy in life and spring and the love of his brother and sister. "Everything—the wind in the trees, and in the chimney at night, and the little toads that sing,—do you ever hear them?—and the fire, and, and—everything!"

"And youth," said the old gentleman to himself, "and an unconscious courage to surmount all obstacles. But perhaps, after all, the unseen part of Applegate Farm is the more beautiful." Aloud, he said: "Do you like to look at odd things? That is—I mean—"

Kirk helped him out. "I do like to," he said.