because it was the same publishing house that had brought out “The King of the Fairies.” Kate read the large round black handwriting quite mechanically and without any motive of curiosity as Elsie stepped past her out of the car.

When Elsie was halfway up the post-office steps she turned and ran back to the curb. “Tell me,” she said, “didn’t Aunt Katherine ask us to do something for her? I’ve quite forgotten what it was.”

“Yes. A dollar book of stamps and ten special deliveries. She gave you the money.”

“Oh, thanks. Good for your memory.”

“What is she sending to those publishers?” Kate found herself wondering when the spinning glass doors had closed on her “cousin.” “There was a special delivery stamp on it, too. And it filled her mind so full that she quite forgot Aunt’s errands. Can Elsie be trying to write? Oh, wouldn’t that be exciting!”

“Now Holt and Holt’s,” Elsie ordered Timothy when she returned to the car.

“Holt and Holt’s is a grocery store. I noticed it as we came by,” Kate said. “I didn’t hear Aunt Katherine say anything about groceries.”

“Of course not. Julia, the cook, attends to all that over the telephone. This is my errand. Do you mind?”

Kate refused to rise to the sarcasm in Elsie’s “Do you mind?”

But at the grocers’ she said, “I think I’ll come, too, and stretch my legs.”

“All right.” But Kate distinctly felt that Elsie did not at all like the idea of having her companionship in the store. However, her pride would not let her turn back now, of course.

Elsie’s order was given briskly: “A head of crisp Iceland lettuce,” she said, “a small bottle of salad oil, genuine Italian, half a pound of almonds, half a dozen eggs, and the smallest loaf of bread you have. Oh, yes, and a pound of flour, if you sell so little.”

“Thanks,” said the young clerk who had written the order down in his book.

But Elsie waited. He looked at her inquiringly. “Anything more?”

“No. But I want what I ordered.”

“I thought we’d send it, of course. It will be quite a load.”

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