dreams, and, to tell the truth, we are not over and above pleased
with it. By the way, she spent last summer at the hotel, and you
must have seen her, did you not? Anyway, Mrs. Burton and Aunt Truth
were old school friends, and Bell has known Laura for two years, but
they will never follow in their mothers' footsteps. Laura is so
different from her mother that I should never think they were
relations; and she has managed to change all our arrangements in some
mysterious way which we can't understand. I get on very well with
her; she positively showers favours upon me, and I more than half
suspect it is because she thinks I don't amount to much. As for the
others, she rubs Polly the wrong way, and I believe she is a little
bit jealous of Bell.

You see, she is several months older than the rest of us, and has
spent two winters in San Francisco, where she went out a great deal
to parties and theatres, so that her ideas are entirely different
from ours.

She wants every single bit of attention--one boy to help her over the
brooks, one to cut walking-sticks for her, another to peel her
oranges, and another to read Spanish with her, and so on. Now, you
know very well that she will never get all this so long as Bell
Winship is in camp, for the boys think that Bell drags up the sun
when she's ready for him in the morning, and pushes him down at night
when she happens to feel sleepy.

We, who have known Bell always, cannot realise that any one can help
loving her, but there is something in Laura which makes it impossible
for her to see the right side of people. She told me this morning
that she thought Bell had grown so vain and airy and self-conscious