oked serious.

"Patty," he said, "you know you're not to do anything unbecoming or
ridiculous. Don't you go and sell goods behind a counter, or anything
extreme like that."

"No, sir; I won't. I promise not to put myself in the public eye in any
such fashion. And you may trust me, father, not to do anything of which
you'd disapprove, if you knew all about it."

"That's a good Patty-girl! Well, go ahead in your mad career, and if you
keep your part of the bargain, I'll keep mine."

Patty started off, and this time she gave Miller an address not so far
away as before. When he brought the motor-car to a standstill, before a
fashionable millinery shop, he felt none of the surprise that he had when
he took Patty to what he considered inappropriate places.

"Now, Miller," said Patty, as she got out of the car, "you are not to
wait for me, but I want you to return here for me at five o'clock."

"Here, Miss Fairfield?"

"Yes; right here. Come exactly at five, and wait for me to come out."

"Yes, Miss Fairfield," said Miller, and Patty turned and entered the
shop.

"I'm 'most sorry I sent him away," she thought to herself, "for I may not
want to stay. Well, I can go home in a street-car."

Though Patty's costume was plain and inconspicuous, it bore so evidently
the stamp of taste and refinement, that the saleswoman who met her
assumed she had come to buy a hat.

But it was early for fashionable ladies to be out shopping, so the rather
supercilious young woman greeted Patty with a cautious air of reserve. It
was so different from the effusive manner usually shown to Nan and Patty
when they really went shopping, that Patty was secretly much amused. But
as she was also secretly greatly embarrassed, it was with an uncertain
air that she said:

"I am not shopping; I wish to see Madame Villard."

"Madame is not here. What can I do for you?"

"I have come in answer to her advertisement for an assistant milliner."

"Oh," said the young woman, raising her eyebrows, and at once showing an
air of haughty condescension. "You should have asked for the forewoman,
not Madame."

Patty's sense of humour got the better of her resentment, and it was with
difficulty she repressed a smile, as she answered:

"Indeed? Well, it is not yet too late to correct my error. Will you show
me to the forewoman?"

Patty's inflections were not in the least sarcastic, in fact her whole
manner was gentle and gracious, but something in her tone