"Any way, I haven't anything better to suggest," said Dorothy dryly.
Mr. Anderson walked off, giving a roar of amusement as he left them.
"Where does the sun rise from here?" asked Ethel Blue as she stood at the spot where was to be the front of the house, and gazed about her. "Does the house face directly south?"
"No, it faces just half way between south and west. The corners of the house point to north, south, east and west. Mother said that if the front was due south the back would be due north and she didn't want a whole side of her house facing north."
"It does have a chilly sound," shivered Ethel Brown.
"With a point stretching toward the north the rooms that have a northern exposure will also have the morning sun and the afternoon sun."
"I know Aunt Louise will have her dining room where the morning sun will shine in."
"Yes, _ma'am_," returned Dorothy emphatically. "It makes you feel better all day if you eat your breakfast in the sunshine. By this plan of Mother's every room in the house will have direct sunshine at some part of the day."
"It's great," approved Ethel Blue. "Can't we ask Mr. Anderson about making a bird's bath out of cement?" she inquired. "Ethel Brown and I saw a beauty at Mrs. Schermerhorn's and perhaps he'd let us have some of the concrete to-morrow when the men are mixing it, and we can try to make one."
The girls raced over to the spot where the contractor was just about to get into his Ford, and stopped him.
"Would you mind letting us have a little concrete to-morrow to make a bird's bath with?" begged Dorothy breathlessly.
"A bird's bath?" repeated Mr. Anderson. "How are you going to make it?"
"Couldn't we put some concrete in a pan and squeeze another pan down on to it and let it harden?"
"Why, yes, something like that," returned Mr. Anderson slowly.
"Yes, indeed," all three girls cried in chorus.
He smiled at their enthusiasm and offered a suggestion.
"I suppose you want the bird's bath for your garden, Miss Dorothy;--why don't you make a little pool for the garden?"
"If you could get a tub and lay down a flooring of concrete and then put in another tub enough smaller so that there would be a space between the walls, then you could fill the space with concrete. When it set, you could take out the inner tub after two or three days and turn the concrete out of the outer tub and there you'd have a concrete tub that you could move about."