nk.

"Except that we miss you awfully over home," added Uncle Charley.

"I don't see how you can," said Patty, smiling; "as I took breakfast
there this morning, you haven't yet gathered round your lonely board
without me."

"No, but we shall have to," said Uncle Charley, "and it is that which is
breaking my young heart."

"Well, _this_ is what's breaking _my_ young heart," said Patty, as she
watched Pansy Potts, who was just entering the room with a dish
containing a most unattractive-looking failure.

"I may as well own up," she said bravely, as the dessert was placed in
front of her. "My ambition was greater than my ability."

"Don't say another word," said Aunt Alice. "_I_ understand; those
spun-sugar things are monuments of total depravity."

Patty gave her aunt a grateful glance, and said, "They certainly are,
Aunt Alice; and I'll never attempt one again until I've made myself
perfect by long practice."

"Good for you, my Irish Pat," said Frank; "but, do you know, I like them
better this way. There's an attraction about that general conglomeration
that appeals to me more strongly than those over-neat concoctions that
look as if they had sat in a caterer's window for weeks."

But, notwithstanding Frank's complimentary impulses, the dessert proved
uneatable, and had to be replaced with crackers and cheese and fruit
and bonbons.

CHAPTER IX

A CALLER

It was quite late in the evening before the Elliotts left Boxley Hall;
but after they had gone, Patty and her father still lingered in the
library for a bit of cosey chat.

"Isn't it lovely," said Patty, with a little sigh of extreme content, "to
sit down in our own library, and talk over our own party? And, by the
way, papa, how do you like our library; is it all your fancy painted it?"

"Yes," said Mr. Fairfield, looking around critically, "the library is all
right; but, of course, as yet it is young and inexperienced. It remains
for us to train it up in the way it should go; and I feel sure, under our
ministrations and loving care, it will grow better as it grows older."

"We've certainly got good material to work on," said Patty, giving a
satisfied glance around the pretty room. "And now, Mr. Man, tell me what
you think of our first effort at hospitality? How did the dinner party go
off today?"

"It went off with flying colours, and you certainly deserve a great deal
of credit for your very successful first appearance as a hostess. Of
cou