s served--pink and luscious, with a
wreath of rosy strawberries encircling each plate--that she spoke.

"Well," she said, "I don't know's I mind now about those fish being
burned," with which oracular remark, she helped herself to two slices
of cake, and ate up her ice in silence.

Nannie May was thirteen and looked about eleven. She was red-haired
and fiery-tempered, and she loved Anne with all the strength of her
loyal heart. As yet she did not like Judy. It was all very well to
look like a princess, but that was no reason why one should be as stiff
as a poker. She hoped Anne would not love Judy better than she did
her, and she noted jealously the rapt attention with which Anne
observed the newcomer and listened to all she said.

Judy was telling the episode of the ice-box. She told it well, and in
spite of herself Nannie had to laugh.

"When I went in there were salads to right of me, cold tongue to the
left of me, and roast chicken in front of me," said Judy, gesticulating
dramatically, "and I was so hungry that it seemed too good to be true
that Perkins should have provided all of those things. And just then
the door slammed and my match went out--and there I was in the cold and
the dark--and I just screamed for Anne."

"Why didn't you put the latch up when you went in?" asked Nannie,
scornfully. "It seems to me 'most anybody would have thought of that."

Anne came eagerly to her friend's defence.

"Neither of us knew it was a spring latch," she said, "and I was as
surprised as Judy was."

"Why didn't you eat up all the things?" asked Amelia, as she helped
herself to another chocolate.

"I didn't have any light--" began Judy.

"Well, I should have eaten them up in the dark," mused Amelia, as
Perkins passed her the salted almonds for the sixth time.

"It was a good thing I didn't," laughed Judy, "or you wouldn't have had
anything to eat to-day. Would they, Perkins?"

For once in his life Perkins was in an affable mood. The lunch had
gone off well, there had been no spiders in the cream or red ants in
the cake. The coffee had been hot and the salads cold, and now that
lunch was over he could pack the dishes away to be washed by the
servants at home, and rest on his laurels.

"I should have found something, Miss," he said, cheerfully; then as a
big drop splashed down on his bald head, he leaned over the Judge.

"I think it is going to rain, sir," he murmured, confidentially.

"By George," g