ou're teasing me now, papa," she said, "but I don't see why.
Just because I want to ask my cousins to come here and return the visits
I made to them last year."

"But you didn't visit them all at once, my child, and you certainly could
not expect to entertain them here all at once. Your list of cousins is a
very long one, and even if there were room for them in the house, the
care and responsibility of such a house party would be enough to land you
in a sanitarium when it was over, if not before."

"There are an awful lot of them," said Patty.

"And they're not altogether congenial," said her father. "Although I
haven't seen them as lately as you have, yet I can't help thinking, from
what you told me, that the Barlows and the St. Clairs would enjoy
themselves better if they visited here at different times, and I'm sure
the same is true of your Boston cousins."

"You're right," said Patty, "as you always are, and I don't believe I'd
have much fun with all that company at once, either. So I think we'll
have them in detachments, and first I'll just invite Ethelyn and Reginald
down for a week or two. I don't really care much about having them, but
Ethelyn has written so often that she wants to come that I don't see how
I can very well get out of it."

"If she wants to come, you certainly ought to ask her. You visited there
three months, you know."

"Yes, I know it, and they were very kind to me. Aunt Isabel had parties,
and did things for my pleasure all the time. Well, I'll invite them right
away. Perhaps I ought to ask Aunt Isabel, too."

"Yes, you might ask her," said Mr. Fairfield, "and she can bring the
children down, but she probably will not stay as long as they do."

So Patty wrote for her aunt and cousins, and the first day of July
they arrived.

Mrs. St. Clair, who was Patty's aunt only by marriage, was a very
fashionable woman of a pretty, but somewhat artificial, type. She liked
young people, and had spared no pains to make Patty's visit to her a
happy one. But it was quite evident that she expected Patty to return her
hospitality in kind, and she had been at Boxley Hall but a few hours
before she began to inquire what plans Patty had made for her
entertainment.

Now, though Patty had thought out several little pleasures for her
cousins, it hadn't occurred to her that Aunt Isabel would expect parties
made for her.

She evaded her aunt's questions, however, and waited for an opportunity
to speak alo