She stood in the deep carved stone entrance-way to Mrs. Geoffrey's
house, in the same fearless, Red Riding Hood fashion, just as she
would have waited in any little country porch up in Homesworth,
where she had need indeed to knock.

Not a whit dismayed was she either, when the tall manservant opened
to her, and admitted her into the square, high, marble-paved hall,
out of which great doors were set wide into rooms rich and quiet
with noble adorning and soft shading,--where pictures made such a
magic upon the walls, and books were piled from floor to ceiling;
and where her little figure was lost as she went in, and she
hesitated to take a seat anywhere, lest she should be quite hidden
in some great arm-chair or sofa corner, and Mrs. Geoffrey should not
see her when she came down.

So, as the lady entered, there she was, upright and waiting, on her
two feet, in her nankeen dress, just within the library doors, with
her face turned toward the staircase.

"I am Hazel Ripwinkley," she began; as if she had said, I am
Pease-blossom or Mustard-seed; "I go to school with Ada." And went
on, then, with her compliments and her party. And at the end she
said, very simply,--

"Miss Craydocke is coming, and she knows the games."

"Miss Craydocke, of Orchard Street? And where do you live?"

"In Aspen Street, close by, in Uncle Oldways' house. We haven't