n either hand.

"M-m-m-my old ones!" she gasped in horror-stricken accents.
"B-b-b-brought them by mistake!" It was some moments before her
companions fully grasped the situation, for the new slippers had been
black too, and of much the same make as those now exhibited. Mrs
Asplin had had many yearnings over white shoes and stockings, all silk
and satin, and tinkling diamond buckles like those which had been
displayed in Peggy's dress-box. Why should not her darlings have dainty
possessions like other girls? It went to her heart to think what an
improvement these two articles would make in the simple costumes; then
she remembered her husband's delicate health, his exhaustion at the end
of the day, and the painful effort with which he nerved himself to fresh
exertions, and felt a bigger pang at the thought of wasting money so
hardly earned. As her custom was on such occasions, she put the whole
matter before the girls, talking to them as friends, and asking their
help in her decision.

"You see, darlings," she said, "I want to do my very best for you, and
if it would be a real disappointment not to have these things, I'll
manage it somehow, for once in a way. But it's a question whether you
would have another chance of wearing them, and it seems a great deal of
money to spend for just one evening, when poor dear father--"

"Oh, mother, no, don't think of it! Black ones will do perfectly well.
What can it matter what sort of shoes and stockings we wear? It won't
make the least difference in our enjoyment," said Esther the sensible;
but Mellicent was by no means of this opinion.

"I don't know about that! I love white legs!" she sighed dolefully.
"All my life long it has been my ambition to have white legs. Silk ones
with little bits of lace let in down the front, like Peggy's. They're
so beautiful! It doesn't seem a bit like a party to wear black
stockings; only of course I know I must, for I'd hate to waste father's
money. When I grow up I shall marry a rich man, and have everything I
want. It's disgusting to be poor... Will they be nice black slippers,
mother, with buckles on them?"

"Yes, dearie. Beauties! Great big buckles!" said Mrs Asplin lovingly;
and a few days later a box had come down from London, and the slippers
had been chosen out of a selection of "leading novelties"; worn with
care and reverence the previous evening, "to take off the stiffness,"
and then after all--oh, the awfulness of