Part 17

She jingled her bracelets, and picked at the long chain dangling from her neck, and stared at them all.

"Oh my goodness!" exclaimed Polly Pepper with very red cheeks. "Alexia, don't--don't," she begged.

"Well, I don't care," said Alexia recklessly, "the girls are always picking at me because I will keep next to you, Polly, and you're my very dearest friend, and----"

"But Sally had such a fright about her pin," said Polly in a low tone. Alexia was crowded up close and hugging her arm, so no one else heard.

"Well, that old pin dropped in the ribbon; she had it herself all the time, oh dear!" Alexia nearly went off again at the remembrance.

"She felt badly, all the same," said Polly slowly. She didn't even smile, and Alexia could feel that the arm was slipping away from her.

"Oh dear me!" she began, then she dropped Polly Pepper's arm. "Sally, you may go next," she cried suddenly, and she skipped back into the bunch of the other girls.

Polly sent her an approving little nod, and she didn't fail to smile now. Alexia ran over to the wagonette, and hopped in, not daring to trust herself to see Sally Moore's satisfaction ahead in the coveted seat.

The other girls jumping in, the wagonette was soon filled, and away they spun for the two miles over to the Hornes' beautiful place. And before long, their respects having been paid to Mrs. Horne, the whole bevy was up in Silvia's pretty pink and white room overlooking the lake.

"I think it's just too lovely for anything here, Silvia Horne," exclaimed Sally, whose spirits were quite recovered now. She had her aunt's pin all safe, and she had ridden up next to Polly. "Oh girls, she has a new pincushion and cover."

"Yes, a whole new set," said Silvia carelessly, as the girls rushed over from the bed where they were laying their things, to see this new acquisition to the beautiful room.

"Well, if I could have such perfectly exquisite things," breathed Alexia as they all oh-ed and ah-ed over the pink ribbons and dainty lace, "I'd be the very happiest girl."

Kathleen Briggs thrust her long figure in among the bevy. "That toilet set is very pretty," she said indifferently and with quite a young-lady air.

"Very pretty!" repeated Alexia, turning her pale eyes upon her in astonishment, "well, I should think it was! It's too perfectly elegant for anything!"

"Oh dear me!" Kathleen gave a little laugh. "It's just nothing to the one I have on my toilet table at home. Besides, I shall bring home some Oriental lace, and have a new one: I'm going around the world to-morrow, you know."

"Oh my goodness!" exclaimed Alexia faintly. And the other girls fell back, and stared respectfully.

"Yes," said Kathleen, delighted at the effect she had produced. "We start to-morrow, and we don't know how long we shall be gone. Perhaps two years. Papa says he'll stay if we want to; but mamma and I may get tired and come home." She jingled her bracelets worse than ever.

"They've come to bid us good-bye, you see," said Silvia, to break the uncomfortable silence.

"Oh yes," said Polly Pepper.

"Well, if you've got your things off, let's go out of doors," proposed Silvia suddenly.

"Yes, do let's." The girls drew a long breath as they raced off.

"I think that Kathleen Briggs is too perfectly horrid for anything"--Alexia got up close to Polly as they flew down the stairs--"with her going round the world, and her sniffing at Silvia's toilet set."

"Hush--hush!" whispered Polly, "she'll hear you."

"Well, I don't care; and she's going round the world to-morrow, so what does it signify?" said Alexia. "Oh, don't go so fast, Polly. You most made me tumble on my nose."

"Well, you mustn't come with me, then, if you don't keep up," said Polly, with a merry little laugh, and hurrying on.

"I'm going to keep up," cried Alexia, dashing after, "but you go so fast," she grumbled.

"We're going to have tea out on the lawn," announced Silvia in satisfaction, as the bevy rushed out on the broad west piazza.

The maids were already busily setting three little tables, that were growing quite pretty under their hands.