said you were asleep in your room. Papa Jack and I have been
planning a great surprise for you, and he did not want to mention it until
all the arrangements were completed. That is why there was no birthday
surprise for you at breakfast. But you'll soon be a very happy little
girl, for this surprise is something you have been wanting for more than a
year."

How suddenly the whole world had changed for the Little Colonel! The
sunshine had never seemed so golden, the locust blooms so deliciously
sweet. Her birthday had not been forgotten, after all. Mrs. Sherman's
chair was wheeled to the table on the balcony, and Lloyd took her seat
with sparkling eyes. She wondered what the surprise could be, and felt
sure that Papa Jack would not tell her until the cake was cut, and the
last birthday wish made with the blowing of the birthday candles.

He had intended to save his news to serve with the dessert, but when he
questioned Lloyd as to how she had spent the day, and laughed at her for
reading the old tale of Marguerite's wonder-ball so many times, his secret
escaped him before he knew it. Turning to Mrs. Sherman he said, "By the
way, Elizabeth, our birthday gift for Lloyd might be called a sort of
wonder-ball." Then he looked at his little daughter with a teasing smile,
as he continued, "I wonder if you can guess my riddle. At first your
wonder-ball will unroll a day and night on the cars, then a drive through
a park where you rode in a baby-carriage once upon a time, but through
which you shall go in an automobile this time, if you wish. There'll be
some shopping, maybe, and after that flags flying, and bands playing, and
crowds of people waving good-bye."

He had intended to stop there, but the wondering expression on her face
carried him on further. "I can't undertake to say how much your
wonder-ball can hold, but somewhere near the centre of it will be a
meeting with Betty and Eugenia, and perhaps a glimpse of the Gate of the
Giant Scissors that you are always talking about."

As Lloyd listened a look of utter astonishment crept over her face. Then
she suddenly sprang from her chair, and running to her father put a hand
on each shoulder. "Papa Jack," she cried, breathlessly, "look me straight
in the eyes! Are you in earnest? You don't mean that we are going abroad,
do you? It _couldn't_ be anything so lovely as that, could it?"

For answer he drew an envelope from his pocket and shook it before her
eyes. "Look for you