when she gets mad, she doesn't care what she says."

"I should think she didn't! Well, make her Queen if you want to, but if
you do, you can get somebody else to take my place."

"Oh, Tom, don't act like that," and Marjorie looked at him, with
pleading eyes.

"Yes, I _will act_ like that! Just exactly like that! I won't belong to
any Court that Hester Corey is queen of!"

Marjorie sighed. What _could_ she do with this intractable boy? And, she
almost knew that King would feel the same way. Perhaps, if she could win
Tom over to her way of thinking, King might be more easily influenced.

"Tom," she began, "don't you like me?"

"Yes, I do. You're the squarest girl I ever knew."

"Then, don't you think you might do this much for me?"

"What much?"

"Why, just let Hester be Queen for a while."

"No, I don't. That wouldn't be any favor to you."

"Yes, it would. If I ask you, and you refuse, I'll think you're real
unkind. And yet you say you like me!"

Marjorie had struck a right chord in the boy's heart. He didn't want
Hester for Queen, but still less did he want to refuse Midget her
earnest request.

"Oh, pshaw!" he said, digging his toe in the sand; "if you put it that
way, I'll _have_ to say yes. Don't put it that way, Midget."

"Yes, I _will_ put it that way! And if you're my friend, you'll say yes,
yourself, and then you'll help me to make the other boys say yes. Will
you?"

"Yes, I s'pose so," said Tom, looking a little dubious.

CHAPTER XIII

THIRTEEN!

Marjorie's thirteenth birthday dawned bright and clear.

Her opening eyes rested on some strange thing sticking up at the foot of
her bed, but a fully-awakened glance proved it to be a big No. 13,
painted on a square of white pasteboard, and decorated with painted
four-leaved clovers.

The motto "Good Luck" was traced in ornamental letters, and the whole
was in a narrow wood frame.

"That's my birthday greeting from Cousin Jack and Cousin Ethel!"
Marjorie said to herself; "I recognize her lovely painting, and it's
just like them, anyway. I'll hang that on my bedroom wall, till I'm as
old as Methusaleh."

"Happy Birthday, darling!" said her mother, coming in, and sitting on
the side of the bed; "many happy returns of the day."

"Oh, dearie Mother! I'm so glad I've got you! and I'm _so_ glad you're
really my very own mother! Give me thirteen kisses, please, ma'am!"

"Merry Birthday, Midget!" called her father, through the crack of th