e
refreshments and bring them out here."

It was a glorious suggestion. Six pairs of eyes opened wide with
delight.

"B-but Sarah--" Mabel asked. Mabel had a knack of asking such questions.

"Oh, I reckon Sarah'll ask a heap of questions--Sarah's mighty
inquisitive at times," Patricia answered. "I rather think the best way
will be just to go ahead and not bother her about it."

"But how?" Mabel insisted.

"You leave that to Nell and me--we'll manage. The rest of you must wait
here; keep Custard with you. Oh, dear! I thought you were beautifully
dry, Susy Vail; what did you go sneeze for? Well, you'll just have to
keep moving, that's all. You see that she does, Mabel."

Patricia's commands seldom fell on deaf ears and Mabel promptly insisted
on a game of tag; while Patricia herself, accompanied by Nell Hardy,
started on a brisk run across the meadow.

At the garden gate, Patricia called a halt. "Duck," she ordered,
dropping on the grass. From half-way up the path, came Sarah's voice:
"Oh, Miss P'tricia! Miss P'tricia!"

"She'll go back presently, if she doesn't hear us," Patricia whispered
with elaborate caution; "then we must get to the house as quickly and as
quietly as possible and secure the re--the booty. Oh, go away!" she
added sternly, as Custard came sniffing about them.

But Custard only wriggled and danced about and over them, urging them as
eloquently as he could to get up and continue their way indoors. Wasn't
the pantry indoors? Custard could have told his mistress long ago that
it was quite supper time.

At half-past six, the doctor and Miss Kirby drove into the yard.
As the gig drew up before the side door, Sarah, voluble and indignant,
appeared. From the mass of information she hurled upon them, one fact
only was quite clear--Patricia was missing.

She was so often missing, that the announcement failed to excite any
great apprehension in the mind of either her father or her aunt.

"But the party--" Miss Kirby began.

"She done take the party with her!" Sarah wailed.

Miss Kirby looked more indignant than surprised; to have come home and
found that nothing untowards had happened would have been the surprising
thing.

"I ain't laid my eyes on her since them six gingham aprons came
gavorting up the walk!" Sarah proclaimed dramatically. "That young-un's
a limb, for shore!"

Miss Kirby sat down on the piazza bench. "Gingham aprons, Sarah," she
repeated. "Patrick, what can she mean?"

The