what your real name is?'

"He didn't do it. He just said: 'Oh, bother!' and ran out doors. I
didn't like the boy, but the big room seemed duller after he went out,
so after a while I slipped out, and when I saw you two talking, I came
over here. What were you talking about?"

"We were talking about the fine times we'll have at Cliffmore this
Summer," Polly said, "and we can hardly wait to enjoy them."

"I'd not care to go there," Gwen said, with a toss of her head.

"Well, then," said Rose, "it's lucky you don't have to go there."

"Yes, isn't it?" Gwen said, cheerfully. "I could if I wanted to. Mamma
will go wherever I wish, that is if I just act horrid enough."

"Why, what do you mean?" Polly asked, and Gwen laughed.

"You're funny girls," she said. "Don't either of you know that the way
to get your own way is to scream and be just as horrid as you can
until your mamma 'gives in?'"

"I'd not care to act like that," Princess Polly said, and Rose said:
"Neither would I."

"Well, I want my own way, all the time and everywhere, and that's the
way I get it," declared Gwen, and she danced off down the avenue,
humming as cheerfully as if she had told of doing pleasant things.

"Isn't it queer'?" Rose said. "Gwen tells of being disagreeable, as if
she felt proud of it."

"Mrs. Harcourt does the same thing," said Primrose Polly. "She's
always telling of horrid pranks, and rude things that Gwen says, and
she tells them as if she thought Gwen very smart to act so. It isn't
odd that Gwen behaves so badly, for she likes to act just perfectly
horrid. She says so, and if she thinks her mamma likes it, what is
there to make her stop?"

"And Uncle John says, oh, I'd not tell exactly what he says, but he
said only yesterday that he could not understand how any woman could
let her little daughter grow up like a weed. He said Gwen was pretty
to look at, but as unpleasant as a nettlebush. I'd not like anyone to
say that of me," Rose said.

"Well, no one ever would say that about you," Polly said lovingly.

"Nor you," replied Rose.

Then, their arms clasping each other, they slipped down the sidewalk.

It was but a few days longer that they must wait before sailing to
Cliffmore.

The year before, they had made the trip by train, but this time they
were intending to go a short distance by rail, and then, on Captain
Atherton's yacht, complete the trip by water. It would be a delightful
sail, and as every member of the p