Part 18

"There will be four at each table," said Silvia. "Polly's going to sit with Kathleen and me, and one other girl--I don't know which one yet," she said slowly.

"Oh, choose me." Alexia worked her way along eagerly to the front. "I'm her dearest friend--Polly's, I mean. So you ought to choose me."

"Well, I sha'n't," declared Silvia. "You crowded me awfully at Lucy Bennett's party, and kept close to Polly Pepper all the time."

"Well, that's because you would keep Polly yourself. You crowded and pushed horribly yourself, you know you did." Her long face was quite red now.

"Well, I had to," declared Silvia coolly. "At any rate, you sha'n't have Polly to-day, for I've quite decided. Clem, you shall have the other seat at my table."

Clem hopped up and down and beat her hands together in glee. "There, Alexia Rhys!" she cried in triumph. "Who's got Polly Pepper now, I'd like to know!"

Alexia, much discomfited, fell back. "Well, I think that's a great way to give a party," she said, "to get up a fight the first thing."

But Silvia and Kathleen had got Polly Pepper one on each side, and were now racing down to the lake. "We're going to have a sail," called Silvia over her shoulder, so they all followed, Alexia among the rest, with no time for anything else. There was the steam launch waiting for them.

"Girls--girls!" Mrs. Horne called to them from the library, "wait a moment. Mr. and Mrs. Briggs are going too."

"Oh bother!" began Silvia. Then the color flew into her face, for Kathleen heard.

"I shall tell my mother what you said," she declared.

"Dear me! no, you mustn't," begged Silvia in alarm.

"Yes, I shall too." Kathleen's bracelets jingled worse than ever as she shook them out.

"Well, I call that real hateful," broke out Silvia, a red spot on either cheek, "you know I didn't mean it."

"Well, you said it. And if you think it's a bother to take my mother and father out on your old launch, I sha'n't stop here and bring you anything when I come home from around the world."

Silvia trembled. She very much wanted something from around the world. So she put her arm about Kathleen. "Oh, make up now," she said. "They're coming," as Mr. and Mrs. Briggs advanced down the path. "Promise you won't tell," she begged.

"Yes, do," said Polly Pepper imploringly.

So Kathleen promised, and everything became quite serene, just in time for Mr. and Mrs. Briggs to have the girls presented to them. And then they all jumped into the steam launch, and the men sent her into the lake, and everything was as merry as could be under the circumstances.

"I haven't got to go to school to-morrow," announced Silvia when they were well off. "Isn't that too fine for anything, girls?"

"Dear me! I should say so," cried Alexia enviously. "How I wish I could ever stay home! But aunt is so very dreadful, she makes me go every single day."

"Well, I'm going to stay home to bid Kathleen good-bye, you know," said Silvia.

"You see we are going around the world," announced Mrs. Briggs. She was just like Kathleen as far as mother and daughter could be, and she had more jingling things on, besides a long lace scarf that was catching in everything; and she carried a white, fluffy parasol in her hand. "And we've come to bid good-bye to our relatives before we start. Kathleen, you shouldn't have come out on the water without your hat," for the first time noticing her daughter's bare head.

"None of the girls have hats on," said Kathleen, shaking her long light braids.

"Well, I don't see how their mothers can allow it," exclaimed Mrs. Briggs, glancing around on the group, "but I sha'n't let you, Kathleen. Dear me! you will ruin your skin. Now you must come under my parasol." She moved up on the seat. "Here, come over here."

"Oh, I'm not going to," cried Kathleen with a grimace. "I can't see anything under that old thing. Besides, I'm going to stay with the girls."

"Yes, you must come under my parasol." A frown of real anxiety settled on her mother's face. "You'll thank me by and by for saving your complexion for you, Kathleen; so come over."

"No," said Kathleen, hanging back, and holding to Silvia's arm.

"There's your veil, you know." Mr. Briggs hadn't spoken before, but now he edged up to his wife. "It's in my pocket."