ipe
blueberries. This may not sound poetical to you unless you know or
remember just what the tints of ripe blueberries are--dusky purple in
some lights, clear slate in others, and yet again in others the misty
hue of early meadow violets.

"You really look very well," remarked the real Lucinda to the mirrored
Lucinda. "Nobody would think you were an old maid. But you are. Alice
Penhallow, who is to be married to-night, was a child of five when you
thought of being married fifteen years ago. That makes you an old maid,
my dear. Well, it is your own fault, and it will continue to be your own
fault, you stubborn offshoot of a stubborn breed!"

She flung her train out straight and pulled on her gloves.

"I do hope I won't get any spots on this dress to-night," she reflected.
"It will have to do me for a gala dress for a year at least--and I have
a creepy conviction that it is fearfully spottable. Bless Uncle Mark's
good, uncalculating heart! How I would have detested it if he had given
me something sensible and useful and ugly--as Aunt Emilia would have
done."

They all went to "young" John Penhallow's at early moonrise. Lucinda
drove over the two miles of hill and dale with a youthful second cousin,
by name, Carey Penhallow. The wedding was quite a brilliant affair.
Lucinda seemed to pervade the social atmosphere, and everywhere she went
a little ripple of admiration trailed after her like a wave. She was
undeniably a belle, yet she found herself feeling faintly bored and was
rather glad than otherwise when the guests began to fray off.

"I'm afraid I'm losing my capacity for enjoyment," she thought, a little
drearily. "Yes, I must be growing old. That is what it means when social
functions begin to bore you."

It was that unlucky Mrs. George who blundered again. She was standing on
the veranda when Carey Penhallow dashed up.

"Tell Lucinda that I can't take her back to the Grange. I have to
drive Mark and Cissy Penhallow to Bright River to catch the two o'clock
express. There will be plenty of chances for her with the others."

At this moment George Penhallow, holding his rearing horse with
difficulty, shouted for his wife. Mrs. George, all in a flurry, dashed
back into the still crowded hall. Exactly to whom she gave her message
was never known to any of the Penhallows. But a tall, ruddy-haired girl,
dressed in pale green organdy--Anne Shirley from Avonlea--told Marilla
Cuthbert and Rachel Lynde as a joke the n