y!"

"I don't see but that I must! Nobody else to do it!" she responded
saucily.

"You wouldn't let 'em if they tried!" This from a rosy-cheeked
youngster who was as close to the water's edge as safety permitted.
"Say, did you guess what my floral offering was to be when you trimmed
your hat? I _am_ flattered!"

"Sorry! The hat was trimmed weeks ago, and I'm wearing your bouquet
because it matches."

"Thanks, awfully," replied the crestfallen youth. "Plans for reduction
of head-size constantly on file in Miss Tucker's office."

"Just Carl's luck to hit on a match."

"Don't see any particular luck in being accessory to a hat trimming,"
grumbled Carl.

"Write now and then, Miss Tommy, won't you?" said a fellow with
eyeglasses and an air of fashion.

"Won't promise! I'll wait till I'm rich enough to cable!"

"Shilling a word's expensive, but you can send 'em to me collect. My
word is 'Hopeful,'"--at which the little party laughed.

"Register another, and make it 'Uncertain,'" called the girl
roguishly, seeing that no one was paying any attention to her friends
and their nonsense.

"London first, is it?" asked the rosy youth. "Decided on your hotel?"

"Hotel? It's going to be my share of a modest Bloomsbury lodging," she
answered. "Got to sing my way from a third-floor-back in a side street
to a gorgeous suite at the Ritz!"

"We'll watch you!" cried three in chorus.

"But we'd rather hear you, darling," said a nice, tailor-made girl,
whose puffy eyelids looked as if she had been crying.

"Blessed lamb! I hope I'll be better worth hearing! Oh, do go home,
all of you; especially you, Jessie! My courage is oozing out at the
heels of my shoes. Disappear! I've been farewelling actively for an
hour and casually for a week. If they don't take off the gangplank in
a minute or two I shan't have pluck enough to stick to the ship."

"You can't expect us to brace you up, Tommy," said the rosy youth.
"We're losing too much by it. Come along back! What's the matter with
America?"

"Don't talk to her that way, Carl,"--and the tailor-made girl looked
at him reproachfully. "You know she's got nobody and nothing to come
back to. She's given up her room. She's quarreled with her beastly
uncle at last; all her belongings are in the hold of the steamer, and
she's made up her mind."

"All ashore that's going ashore!" The clarion tones of the steward
rang through the air for the third time, and the loud beating of the
shi