[Illustration: MATCHES'S FUNERAL.]

When it was all over and the little mound over Matches's grave had
been covered with sod, the children were loath to stop playing
funeral. They had enjoyed it so much. Somebody said that we ought to
march down the street so that people could see how funny I looked in
my crape veil; but I could stand it no longer. When I saw that the
band was really moving toward the gate, and that Stuart was about to
lift me into the wagon that had carried Matches's coffin, I shrieked
with rage and bit and tore at my veil until I was soon free.

In about a minute it was nothing but a heap of rags and tatters, and
Phil and Stuart were looking at it and then at each other with
troubled faces. "It's Aunt Patricia's!" one of them gasped. "And it is
all torn to bits! Oh, Dago, you little mischief, how _could_ you? Now
we'll catch it!" As if it were my fault. I don't know what happened
when the veil was taken back. Luckily I had no share in that part of
it, although Miss Patricia seemed to add that to the long list of
grievances she had against me, and her manner toward me grew even
more severe than before.

The excitement of the funeral seemed to make Phil forget the loss of
Matches that day, but he cried next morning when Stuart came down with
me on his shoulder, and there was no frisky little pet for him to
fondle and feed. How he could grieve for her is more than I could
understand. I didn't miss her,--I was glad she was gone. Every day
Phil put fresh flowers on her grave. Sometimes it was only a stiff red
coxcomb or a little stemless geranium that had escaped the early
frost. Sometimes it was only a handful of bright grasses gone to seed.
The doctor's neglected garden flaunted few blooms this autumn, but the