n't tell Esther about--Miss Row being so--
nasty, and about my crying. It will only trouble her more, and I want her
to forget, and we will all try to be very jolly to-day, won't we?"

Poppy nodded her head vigorously; but there was a doubtful expression on
her pretty face. "She will see you've been crying," she said gravely.

"No. We will sit here facing the breeze, and that will soon make my face
and eyes look all right, and--we will laugh and talk as if nothing had
happened. We are going to have a really jolly day, aren't we?"

Poppy nodded again; but a second later she shook her head gravely.
"I sha'n't ever forget what Anna said about laughing before breakfast,"
she said very seriously. "It comes true."

Side by side on the springy turf the two little figures sat, leaning
against each other lovingly, waiting for the sweet breeze to take away all
traces of sorrow; telling secrets the while of what they would do by and
by, when they were grown-up, and trying bravely to forget their own
troubles for the benefit of others.

CHAPTER XV.

At last, finding the others did not come back to them, Poppy and Penelope
got up and prepared to follow them. "I suppose they don't mean to go any
farther in this direction," said Penelope. "Are my eyes all right,
Poppy?"

Poppy assured her, truthfully, that no one would know she had shed a tear,
and Esther and Angela, seated on a boulder waiting for them, saw no trace
on either face, and suspected nothing of the storm that had come and gone
since they parted.

"I am frantically hungry, aren't you?" called Penelope gaily, as they drew
near.

They were all ravenous.

"Let's go back and have lunch at once," suggested Esther. "Did you get
away from that horrid old thing pretty soon?"

They all understood who the 'horrid old thing' was without explanation,
and none of them felt inclined to quarrel with the description.

"Oh yes, pretty soon," said Penelope, in an off-hand way, as she stooped
to pick some sweet wild thyme.

"I shall never like her any more," said Angela emphatically. "She was so
horrid to Esther."

"I wouldn't be taught by her for something," said Esther. "I don't envy
you, Pen."

Pen felt a big sinking at her heart at the thought of her music lessons,
and Miss Row's last words to her; but she made a brave effort to be
cheerful. "She--she _can_ be very nice," she said lamely.

"It's all very well for you to talk," said Angela, whose usua