up, and swung it over to Polly.

"Goodness me!" said Polly with a little laugh, "I remember now, I tossed
it on the bed, I thought. Well, I'm ready now, thank fortune," pinning
on her hat. "Good-bye, Pet."

"I am so very glad it is found, Polly," said Phronsie, getting up on
tiptoe to pull Polly's hat straight and get another kiss.

"Come on, Polly," called Alexia, flying over the stairs. "Yes, yes,
girls, she's coming! Oh dear me, Polly, we'll be late!"

V AT SILVIA HORNE'S

But they weren't--not a bit of it--and had ten minutes to spare as they
came rushing up to the station platform.

"Oh, look--look, girls." Polly Pepper pointed up to the clock, pushing
back the damp rings of hair from her forehead. "Oh dear me--I'm so hot!"

"And so am I," panted the other girls, dashing up. One of them sank down
on the upper step, and fanned herself in angry little puffs with her
hat, which she twitched off for that purpose.

"Just like you, Alexia," cried one when she could get her breath,
"you're always scaring us to death."

"Well, I'm sure I was scared myself, Clem," retorted Alexia, propping
herself against the wall. "Oh dear! I can't breathe; I guess I'm going
to die--whew, whew!"

As Alexia made this statement quite often on similar occasions, the
girls heard it with the air of an old acquaintance, and straightened
their coats and hats, and pulled themselves into shape generally.

"Oh my goodness, how you look, Sally! Your hat is all over your left
eye." Alexia deserted her wall, and ran over to pull it straight.

"You let me be," cried Sally crossly, and twitching away. "If it hadn't
been for you, my hat would have staid where I put it. I'll fix it
myself." She pulled out the long pin.

"Oh dear me! now the head has come off," she mourned.

"Oh my goodness! Your face looks the worst--isn't it sweet!" cried
Alexia coolly, who hadn't heard this last.

"Don't, Alexia," cried Polly, "she's lost her pin."

"Misery!" exclaimed Alexia, starting forward, "oh, where, where--"

"It isn't the pin," said Sally, holding that out, "but the head has
flown off." She jumped off from the step and began to peer anxiously
around in the dirt, all the girls crowding around and getting dreadfully
in the way.

"What pin was it, Sally?" asked Polly, poking into a tuft of grass
beneath the steps, "your blue one?"

"No; it was my best one--oh dear me!" Sally looked ready to cry, and
turned away so that the girls could