that heart can wish, you look like a sour-faced, cross-grained,
disgruntled old maid! So there now! And, Miss, do you want to know
what _I_ think of you?" She picked up her hair brush, and shook it
at the flushed, angry face in the mirror. "Well, _I_ think you're
a monster of selfishness! You're a dragon of ingratitude! And a
griffin of cross-patchedness! Now, Miss, WILL you drop this
attitude of injured innocence, and act like a civilised human
being?"

Patty was a little over hard on herself. She hadn't at all
exhibited such traits as she charged herself with, but she was not
a girl to do things by halves. She sat, calmly looking at her own
face, until the lines smoothed themselves out of her forehead, the
dimples came back to her cheeks, and the laughter to her blue
eyes.

"That's better!" she said, wagging her head at the pretty, smiling
face. "Now, never again, Patty Fairfield, let me see you looking
mopy or peevish about anything! Mind, not about anything at all!
You have enough blessings and pleasures to make up for any
disappointments that may come to you. So, now that you've braced
up, just STAY braced up! See?"

The scolding, though self-inflicted, did Patty good, and humming a
lively tune, she busied herself with arranging some fans and
frills in boxes to take away with her.

If stray thoughts of the Pageant or the Fancy Dance crept into her
mind, she determinedly thrust them out, and forced her
anticipations to the unknown fun and gaiety she would enjoy at the