ss after the "few touches" had
been given to her bonnet and neck ribbon.

"Come, Kate, will you take this parasol of mine?" said her cousin.

"Oh, yes, and I must take some money, I suppose," said Kate, going to
her box and unlocking it. She did not like her cousin to see what a
small store of money she had, and so she put the purse into her pocket
as it was, but not intending to spend more than a shilling, for the
little sum her mother had given her was to last three months for her
extra expenses.

CHAPTER IV.

THE LOST PURSE.

Sunday "outings," in the holiday-making sense, were not much to Kate's
fancy, but she had exhausted all her excuses and objections, and found
herself forced to yield to Marion's proposal. So the two girls went
off and found their friends waiting for them a short distance from the
shop. The bells of various churches were ringing for morning service,
and Kate ventured to whisper to her cousin that she would like to go,
but Marion shook her head so decidedly that she gave up the point at
once, but she did not take much interest in the discussion that was
going on about the rival attractions of Greenwich and Richmond, saying
she knew nothing about either.

At last it was decided that they should spend the afternoon at
Greenwich, going and returning by water. The young men walked with
them almost as far as Marion's home, but left them at the corner of the
street, and nothing was said to her father about these companions of
their walk. When Isabel heard where they were going she declared she
must have her bonnet altered, and Marion sat down to do this while her
sister got the dinner ready.

As they were going out after dinner, Marion said, "Perhaps we shall
stop out to tea, father. I want to go and see a friend to-day, and she
is sure to ask us to stay to tea."

"Very well, my dear, I can manage to get tea for myself and the boys,"
said her father, carelessly. Marion always had been allowed to do very
much as she pleased, and since her mother's death, and she had got a
situation, she had taken the reins quite into her own hands, and seldom
asked advice, and still more rarely accepted it when it was offered.

Kate felt rather uncomfortable at first, when she thought of this
steamboat excursion, but she soon forgot this in the pleasure and
novelty of the scene around her, and she stifled the voice of
conscience, by whispering that this would not happen again--she had
only come t