The girls paused in the porch under the tendrils of ivy and knocked
at the open door. There was a patter of steps inside and a rather odd
little personage presented herself . . . a girl of about fourteen, with a
freckled face, a snub nose, a mouth so wide that it did really seem as
if it stretched "from ear to ear," and two long braids of fair hair tied
with two enormous bows of blue ribbon.

"Is Miss Lewis at home?" asked Diana.

"Yes, ma'am. Come in, ma'am. I'll tell Miss Lavendar you're here, ma'am.
She's upstairs, ma'am."

With this the small handmaiden whisked out of sight and the girls,
left alone, looked about them with delighted eyes. The interior of this
wonderful little house was quite as interesting as its exterior.

The room had a low ceiling and two square, small-paned windows,
curtained with muslin frills. All the furnishings were old-fashioned,
but so well and daintily kept that the effect was delicious. But it must
be candidly admitted that the most attractive feature, to two healthy
girls who had just tramped four miles through autumn air, was a table,
set out with pale blue china and laden with delicacies, while little
golden-hued ferns scattered over the cloth gave it what Anne would have
termed "a festal air."

"Miss Lavendar must be expecting company to tea," she whispered. "There
are six places set. But what a funny little girl she has. She looked
like a messenger from pixy land. I suppose she could have told us the
road, but I was curious to see Miss Lavendar. S . . . s . . . sh, she's
coming."

And with that Miss Lavendar Lewis was standing in the doorway. The girls
were so surprised that they forgot good manners and simply stared.
They had unconsciously been expecting to see the usual type of elderly
spinster as known to their experience . . . a rather angular personage,
with prim gray hair and spectacles. Nothing more unlike Miss Lavendar
could possibly be imagined.

She was a little lady with snow-white hair beautifully wavy and thick,
and carefully arranged in becoming puffs and coils. Beneath it was an
almost girlish face, pink cheeked and sweet lipped, with big soft brown
eyes and dimples . . . actually dimples. She wore a very dainty gown of
cream muslin with pale-hued roses on it . . . a gown which would have
seemed ridiculously juvenile on most women of her age, but which suited
Miss Lavendar so perfectly that you never thought about it at all.

"Charlotta the Fourth says tha