Godmother's expostulations with the ponies, till Cousin Grace, growing
tired of playing her bright eyes first on this, then on that, brought
them back to Laura and studied her up and down.

"I say, who on earth trimmed your hat?" she asked almost at once.

"Mother," answered Laura bravely, while the colour mounted to her cheeks
again.

"Well, I guess she made up her mind you shouldn't get lost as long as
you wore it," went on her cousin with disconcerting candour. "It makes
you look just like a great big red double dahlia."

"Let the child be. She looks well enough," threw in Godmother in her
snappish way. But Laura was sure that she, too disapproved; and felt
more than she heard the muttered remark about "Jane always having had a
taste for something gay."

"Oh, I like the colour very much. I chose it myself," said Laura, and
looked straight at the two faces before her. But her lips twitched. She
would have liked to snatch the hat from her head, to throw it in front
of the ponies and hear them trample it under their hoofs. She had never
wanted the scarlet lining of the big, upturned brim; in a dislike
to being conspicuous which was incomprehensible to Mother, she had
implored the latter to "leave it plain". But Mother had said: "Nonsense!"
and "Hold your tongue!" and "I know better,"--with this result.

Oh yes, she saw well enough how Godmother signed with her eyes to Cousin
Grace to say no more; but she pretended not to notice, and for the
remainder of the drive nobody spoke. They went past long lines of grey