stood there with the pale morning light gilding her pigtails. Her head was bare, for Gritty Kestrell was trying on Phœbe's new leghorn hat trimmed with heliotrope ribbon, Gritty's passion for dressing up was one of the few weaknesses that betrayed her sex. Ever since she had seen Uncle Tom's Cabin she had shown a tendency to strut about as Topsy or Aunt Ophelia. She could also impersonate Miss Todd singing her solos, and was particularly successful as Pokey Ned, the village idiot.
Walter was playing marbles with Bob Meddar and Skinny Wiggins. Paul was about to hurry forward with his rosebud and slip it into Phœbe's hand while the others were watching Gritty's antics, when Phœbe leaned down toward her basket and picked up a bouquet that was resting on it—a bouquet of four tea-roses—and buried her nose in it.
Paul swung on his heel.
Aunt Verona was astonished to see him. She knew how eagerly he had been looking forward to the trip to Slate Beach and hoarding pennies for ice-cream.
"I'm not going," he said, and Aunt Verona took the basket without further inquiry.
"I tell you what," she proposed. "Let's you and I have a picnic all by ourselves in the field by the brook. I'll make some doughnut men and animals."
He acquiesced with as much enthusiasm as he could muster, for he realized that Aunt Verona, in offering to go as far as the field, was making an unprecedented concession to comfort him, and he felt he ought to support her effort. But in the playroom, with the door shut, he leaned forward on the keyboard of the big piano and wept.
Although Paul continued on friendly terms with Walter Dreer, he contrived to see less of him, and only his dis-
