en, for he always did everything he could to help
mother to be first with everything; but so she wouldn't blame him, he
said crosslike that if she had let him put them up when they came, as
he wanted to, she'd have been six months ahead.

When they finally got ready to hang the blinds no one knew how they
went. They were a beautiful shiny green, plain on one side, and on the
other there was a silver border across the bottom and one pink rose as
big as a pie plate. Mother had neglected to ask Winfield on which side
the rose belonged. Father said from the way the roll ran, it went
inside. Mother said they were rolled that way to protect the roses,
and that didn't prove anything. Laddie said he would jump on a horse
and ride round the section, and see how Hannah Dover had hers, and
exactly opposite would be right. Everyone laughed, but no one thought
he meant it. Mother had father hold one against the window, and she
stepped outside to see if she could tell from there. When she came in
she said the flower looked mighty pretty, and she guessed that was the
way, so father started hanging them. He had only two up when Laddie
came racing down the Big Hill bareback, calling for him to stop.

"I tell you that's not right, mother!" he said as he hurried in.

"But I went outside and father held one, and it looked real pretty,"
said mother.

"One! Yes!" said Laddie. "But have you stopped to consider how two
rows across the house are going to look? Nine big pink roses, with the
sun shining on them! Anything funnier than Dovers' front I never saw.
And look here!"

Laddie picked up a blind. "See this plain back? It's double coated
like a glaze. That is so the sun shining through glass won't fade it.
The flowers would be gone in a week. They belong inside, mother, sure
as you live."

"Then when the blinds are rolled to the middle sash in the daytime no
one can see them," wailed mother, who was wild about pink roses.

"But at night, when they are down, you can put the curtains back enough
to let the roses show, and think how pretty they will look then."

"Laddie is right!" said father, climbing on the barrel to take down the
ones he had fixed.

"What do you think, girls?" asked mother.

"I think the Princess is coming down the Little Hill," said Shelley.
"Hurry, father! Take them down before she sees! I'm sure they're
wrong."

Father got one all right, but tore the corner of the other. Mother
scolded hi