There were a great many preparations to be made when the eventful afternoon arrived. The hut had to be swept and dusted, late flowers to be gleaned from the garden to decorate the tea-table, cups and saucers packed up and conveyed in baskets, together with the little tin kettle and the methylated spirit lamp, as they could scarcely light a fire on the platform like they did for picnic teas in the woods. Archie hung up a Japanese lantern in the doorway, and fixed a Union-Jack on one side, and the star-spangled banner of the United States on the other, and Peggy found enough Michaelmas daisies and white asters to put a wreath all round the railing of the veranda, which rather suggested harvest decorations, but looked very festive all the same.