Still holding to the table for fear she should bob up again to the ceiling unexpectedly, Frances ate about half the slice, when she laid down the rest, remarking: "I think that's enough, Margaret. I don't feel quite so much like a dandelion seed as I did. Take my hand and let us skip down the room and back, just to try." Down the room they skipped, hand in hand, and back again, jumping over the settee on the way and coming lightly down on the carpet, "Like a pair of soap-bubbles," as Frances put it. "Just exactly," Margaret agreed. "I feel like you feel in a dream sometimes, when you just tap your foot on the floor or your fingers on the backs of the chairs and go floating about the room. How glad I am you asked for aëro-plane water, Frances, or we might never--Come in!" Somebody had tapped at the door, and on Margaret's calling, "Come in," the two little maids appeared once more, courtesying politely, to inquire if the ladies were ready to put on their wreaths and slippers. "Wreaths!" cried Margaret. "Slippers!" cried Frances. "We didn't bring any wreaths and slippers." At this, one of the little maids, whose name, they found, was Anita, smiled and nodded, and going to a cupboard in the wall which the children had not noticed before, she came back with two cardboard boxes, one of which she handed to each little girl. "Are we to open them?" asked Margaret. "If you please, Miss," replied Anita. Each box proved to contain a beautiful wreath made of enameled pink leaves with silver berries--both exactly alike. "Oh! Aren't they pretty!" exclaimed Frances. "Are we to wear them?" "Yes, Miss, if you please," replied the little waiting-maid. "All the court ladies wear wreaths and slippers to match. These are your slippers," running to the cupboard and bringing back two pairs of white satin slippers with big pink rosettes on them. "The King hopes you'll like them." "The King is very kind," replied Margaret. "Yes, these will do beautifully." "Then, if Your Ladyships are ready, will you please to follow us?" So saying, Anita threw open the door, when she and the other little maid, taking hands, went skipping off down a wide hallway, Margaret and Frances skipping after them and poor little Periwinkle with a serious countenance galloping behind, until they arrived at the top of a long flight of steps down which they went, six steps at a time, to find the Admiral and the Court Crier waiting for them. "Quite ready, Ladies?" asked the Admiral. "Then we'll join the garden-party at once." CHAPTER VII COCO BOLO REX "This way, please," said their guide, waving his hand toward a pair of big glass doors, on each of which was painted a monogram--C. B. R.--with a crown above it.