down
on the ground and burst into tears. But she struggled on, and at last,
to her delight, the trees in front of her cleared suddenly, and she saw
before her a little hilly path surmounted by a stile. Hoodie clapped her
hands, or would have done so but for the interference of the basket.

"Hoodie's out of the wood," she said joyfully, "and up there perhaps
I'll see the cottage."

It happened that she was right. When she reached the stile, there, sure
enough, across another little field the cottage, _a_ cottage any way,
was to be seen. A neat little cottage, something like the description
Martin had given of _her_ grandmother's cottage, which, jumbled up with
the picture of long ago Red Riding Hood the first, on the nursery walls,
was in Hoodie's mind as a sort of model of that in quest of which she
had set out on her voyage of discovery. This cottage too had a little
garden with a path up the middle, and at each side were beds, neatly
bordered, which in summer-time no doubt would be gay with simple
flowers. Hoodie glanced round the little garden approvingly as she made
her way up to the door.

"It's just like Martin's cottage," she thought. "But the Hoodie-girl in
the picture was pulling somesing for the door to open and I don't see
nosing to pull. I must knock I 'appose. I am _so_ glad there's been none
woofs."

[Illustration: It's just like Martin's cottage]

Knock--knock--no answer. Knock, knock, _knock_ a little louder this
time. Hoodie began to wonder if the grandmother was going to be out,
like the one in Martin's story--no--a sound at last of some one coming
to open.

CHAPTER III.

LITTLE BABY AND ITS MOTHER.

"Polly put the kettle on,
And let's have tea."

The latch was lifted from the inside, and there stood before Hoodie--not
an old woman with either "big" or little eyes, not a "grandmother" with
a frilly cap all round her face, such as she had been vaguely expecting,
yet certainly not a "woof" either! The person who stood in the doorway
smiling down on the little girl was a very pretty and pleasant-looking
young woman, with a fresh rosy face and merry eyes, and a sleeping baby
in her arms!

For the first moment Hoodie was too surprised to understand what she
saw.

At last, "I want my grandmother," she said. "_You_ aren't my
grandmother. I thought this was her cottage."

The young woman smiled again.

"No, Missy, you must have made a mistake. But _your_ grandmother doesn't