up the last hole in Carol's stocking,--Carol
balancing herself on one foot with nice precision for the purpose. Then,
all ready, they looked at one another again,--even more solemnly.

"Well," said Fairy, "let's go in--and wait."

Silently the others followed her in, and they all sat about,
irreproachably, on the well-dusted chairs, their hands folded
Methodistically in their smooth and spotless laps.

The silence, and the solemnity, were very oppressive.

"We look all right," said Carol belligerently.

No one answered.

"I'm sure Aunt Grace is as sweet as anybody could be," she added
presently.

Dreary silence!

"Don't we love her better than anybody on earth,--except ourselves?"

Then, when the silence continued, her courage waned. "Oh, girls," she
whimpered, "isn't it awful? It's the beginning of the end of everything.
Outsiders have to come in now to take care of us, and Prudence'll get
married, and then Fairy will, and maybe us twins,--I mean, we twins. And
then there'll only be father and Connie left, and Miss Greet, or some
one, will get ahead of father after all,--and Connie'll have to live
with a step-mother, and--it'll never seem like home any more, and--"

Connie burst into loud and mournful wails.

"You're very silly, Carol," Fairy said sternly. "Very silly, indeed. I
don't see much chance of any of us getting married very soon. And
Prudence will be here nearly a year yet. And--Aunt Grace is as sweet and
dear a woman as ever lived--mother's own sister--and she loves us dearly
and--"

"Yes," agreed Lark, "but it's not like having Prudence at the head of
things."

"Prudence will be at the head of things for nearly a year, and--I think
we're mighty lucky to get Aunt Grace. It's not many women would be
willing to leave a fine stylish home, with a hundred dollars to spend on
just herself, and with a maid to wait on her, and come to an ugly old
house like this to take care of a preacher and a riotous family like
ours. It's very generous of Aunt Grace--very."

"Yes, it is," admitted Lark. "And as long as she was our aunt with her
fine home, and her hundred dollars a month, and her maid, I loved her
dearly. But--I don't want anybody coming in to manage us. We can manage
ourselves. We--"

"We need a chaperon," put in Fairy deftly. "She isn't going to do the
housework, or the managing, or anything. She's just our chaperon. It
isn't proper for us to live without one, you know. We're too young. It
is