was a key. It
seemed as if some one had thought that the trunk might be sent for, and
therefore the key must be kept handy. The knot was easily undone. The
key fitted the lock. Her heart beating fast, Barrie lifted the lid, and
up to her nostrils floated a faint fragrance. She had never smelled any
perfume quite like it before. The nearest thing was the scent of a
certain rose in the garden when its petals were dried, as she dried them
sometimes for a bowl in her own room.

It was deep twilight in this corner, but Barrie's eyes were accustoming
themselves to the gloom. In the tray of the big trunk there were hats,
and masses of something fluffy and soft, yet crisp like gauze. "My
mother's things!" she said to herself in a very little voice, with a
catch of the breath at the word "mother." And gently she lifted out the
tray, to carry it nearer the light. There was a cartwheel of a Leghorn
hat in it, wreathed with cornflowers; another hat of white tulle trimmed
with a single waterlily, and a queer little bonnet made of
forget-me-nots. The fluffy stuff was a large blue scarf spangled with
pinkish sequins.

Barrie rested the tray on a marble-topped table, and dipped deep into
the trunk for other treasures. There were several dresses, of delicate
materials and pale shades, or else of daring colours elaborately
trimmed. There was a gown of coral-tinted satin embroidered with gold,
and this was of Empire fashion, so like the styles which Barrie saw in
illustrated papers that it might have been made yesterday. Could a
red-haired woman have chosen to wear such a colour? For a moment the
girl doubted that these had been her mother's possessions; but when she
held the folds of satin under her own chin, she was startled by the
picture in the mirror. Why, coral was far more becoming than blue, which
Miss Hepburn always said was the only colour to go with red hair. It
even occurred to Barrie that she might perhaps be--well, almost pretty.

"What if I _am_ pretty, after all?" she asked herself; for she
worshipped beauty, and it had been sad to feel that to her it was denied
forever--that never could she be like one of those lovely beings in
books with whom men fall desperately in love, and for whom they gladly
die.

In great excitement she took off her short, badly made blue serge, and
put on the coral satin, which was low in the neck, and had tiny puffed
sleeves. The dress fastened at the back, but Barrie had grown clever in
"do