s."

"The car-line that passes this door goes directly to the department
store," answered Gay. "It's only a few blocks away, but we'll take it.
That tomato soup on you certainly does look gory."

Maud had taken the veil from her hat and thrown it over her shoulders in
a way to hide the coffee stains. "Never mind," she said, carelessly, as
they left the restaurant. "Just hold your head up and sail along with
your most princess-like air, and people will be so busy admiring you
that they won't have time to look at your soupy waist."

"Ugh! It smells so greasy and horrid," sniffed the Little Colonel,
ignoring Maud's remark. "It's just like dishwatah and bacon rinds. I
want to get away from it as soon as possible."

"Misses' white shirt-waists?" repeated the saleswoman in the big
department store, when they reached it a few minutes later. "Certainly.
Here is something pretty. The newest fall goods."

She led them to a counter piled high with boxes, and they made a hasty
selection. Some alteration was needed in the collar of the one Lloyd
chose, and in the sleeves of Maud's. While they waited in the
fitting-room, turning over some back numbers of fashion-plates and
magazines, Gay amused herself by wandering around the millinery
department, trying on hats. Presently she found one so becoming that she
ran back to them, delighted.

"It isn't once in a thousand years that I find a picture hat that looks
well with my pug nose!" she cried. "But gaze on this!"

She revolved slowly before them, so radiantly pleased over her discovery
that she looked unusually pretty. Both girls exclaimed over its
becomingness. Then Lloyd's gaze wandered from the airy structure of
chiffon and flowers down Gay's back to her waist-line.

"Mercy, child!" she exclaimed. "You've lost your belt. Every one of
those three safety-pins is showing, and they each look a foot long!"

Gay's hand flew wildly to the back of her dress, but she felt in vain
for a belt under which to hide the pins. She turned toward them with a
hopeless drooping of the shoulders.

"_How_ did I lose it?" she demanded, helplessly. "It had the safest,
strongest kind of a clasp. When do you suppose I did it, and where? I
must have been a sight parading the street this way like an animated
pincushion."

She passed her hand over the obtrusive pins again. "I certainly had it
on when we left the restaurant. Yes, and after we got on the car to come
here, for I remember just after yo