"Yes, she _can_," said Patty. "But she's too cocky. I'd just like to see
that man come back, and show her her place!"

The masqueraders trooped in and the serious business of the day
commenced. The school posed as a whole, then an infinity of smaller
groups disentangled themselves and posed separately, while those who
were not in the picture stood behind the camera and made the others
laugh.

"Young ladies!" the exasperated photographer implored. "Will you kindly
be quiet for just two seconds? You have made me spoil three plates. And
will that monk on the end stop giggling? Now! All ready. Please keep
your eyes on the stove-pipe hole, and hold your positions while I count
three. One, two, three--thank you very much!"

He removed his plate with a flourish, and dove into the dark room.

It was Patty's and Conny's turn to be taken alone, but St. Ursula and
her Eleven Thousand Virgins were clamoring for precedence on the ground
of superior numbers, and they made such a turmoil that the two Gypsies
politely stood aside.

Keren Hersey, as St. Ursula, and eleven little Junior A's--each playing
the manifold part of a Thousand Virgins--made up the group. It was to be
a symbolical picture, Keren explained.

When the Gypsies' turn came a second time, Patty had the misfortune to
catch her dress on a nail and tear a three-cornered rent in the front.
It was too large a hole for even a Gypsy to carry off with propriety;
she retired to the dressing-room and fastened the edges together with
white basting thread.

Finally, last of all, they presented themselves in their dirt and
tatters. The photographer was an artist, and he received them with
appreciative delight. The others had been patently masqueraders, but
these were the real thing. He photographed them dancing, and wandering
on a lonely moor with threatening canvas clouds behind them. He was
about to take them in a forest, with a camp fire, and a boiling kettle
slung from three sticks--when Conny suddenly became aware of a brooding
quiet that had settled on the place.

"Where is everybody?"

She returned from a hasty excursion into the waiting-room, divided
between consternation and laughter.

"Patty! The hearse has gone!--And the street-car people are waiting on
the corner by Marsh and Elkins's."

"Oh, the beasts! They knew we were in here." Patty dropped her three
sticks and rose precipitately. "Sorry!" she called to the photographer,
who was busily dusting off the