d say, a
venomous soul--"

The girls chuckled and Grace answered lightly:

"Well, as long as you admit my beauty I don't care what you say about the
rest."

"Ah, heartless one--" Mollie was beginning, when with a laugh Betty hooked
an arm through hers and hustled the dramatic one in very undramatic
fashion, up the steps into the Hostess House.

"Oh, Betty, you are so impulsive," sighed Mollie, as she was finally
permitted a chair in the kitchen. "If you don't stop rushing around so
you'll have me worn to skin and bones--"

"Goodness, have you got those things, too?" asked Betty, as she hurried
busily from table to pantry and back again. "Please don't be so lazy,
Mollie dear. The boys will be here before we're half ready, and we don't
want to lose a minute of this perfect day."

Harder heart than Mollie's must have softened at this appeal, and she set
to work with a will preparing delicacies for this picnic with the
boys--perhaps the thought was accompanied by a strange, panicky sinking
of the heart--the very last picnic they would have together, at least
until after the war.

"Did Allen have any more news for you, yesterday?" Mollie asked suddenly,
following up this train of thought.

"No, nothing definite," the Little Captain responded, deftly slipping
currant jelly into layers of buttered biscuit. "Of course, he said there
were all sorts of rumors, but since they all came from equally good
sources and no two of them pointed the same way, he wasn't listening to
any of them. All they really know is that the regiment is all ready and
equipped and will surely be on its way very soon."

"I'm not even thinking of it," said Mollie, slamming down the cover of the
bread box by way of emphasis, as Amy and Grace came upon the scene. "I
don't dare to let myself think," she repeated.

"That's right, dear, I wouldn't either," approved Grace, patting her
encouragingly on the back as she passed on her way to the pantry. "You
want to get your mind used to it by degrees, otherwise the shock might be
too great. What's that, Betty--the sugar? Surely. Anything to be
agreeable!" The last hamper had just been done up, filled to the brim
with good things, when the boys arrived.

"Heavens, I'm a fright," cried Grace, viewing herself in the kitchen
mirror--a mirror, by the way, which brought out all a person's bad points
with Puritan honesty.

"Go in and keep the boys quiet, Amy, that's a dear," she begged, then,
seeing refusal