Next day Aunt Maria was quite bearable. The worst thing she said was about people coming when they weren't expected, and upsetting everything. 'I'll try not to upset anything,' said Molly, and went out and got the gardener to put up a swing for her. Then she upset herself out of it, and got a bump on her forehead the size of a hen's egg, and that, as Aunt Maria very properly said, kept her out of mischief for the rest of the day. Next morning Molly had two letters. The first was from Bertie. It said: 'DEAR MOLLY, 'It is rough lines on you, but we did not mean to keep it up, and it is your fault for coming home the day before you ought to have. We did it to kid old Simpshall, because she was so beastly about us making a real battlefield. We only painted all the parts of us that show with vermilion, and put spots--mixed crimson lake and Prussian blue--all over, and we pulled down the blinds and said our heads ached, and so they did with crying--I mean the girls cried. She was afraid to come near us; but she was sorry she had been such a beast. And when she had come to the door and said so through the keyhole we owned up, but you had gone by then. It was a rare lark, but we've got three days bedder for it. I shall lower this on the end of a fishingline to the baker's boy, and he will post it. It is like a dungeon. He is going to bring us tarts, like a faithful page. 'Your affectionate bro., 'BERTRAND DE LISLE CARRUTHERS.' The other letter was from mother. 'MY DARLING MOLLY, It was all a naughty hoax, intended to annoy poor Miss Simpshall. Your brothers and sisters had painted their faces red and purple--they had not measles at all. But since you _are_ at Aunt Maria's I think you may as well stay ...' 'How awful!' said Molly. 'It _is_ too bad!' '... stay and make it your annual visit. Be a good girl, dear, and do not forget to wear your pinafores in the morning. 'Your loving MOTHER.' Molly wrote a nice little letter to her mother. To her brother she said: DEAR BERTIE, I think you are beasts to have let me in for this. You might have thought of me. I shall not forgive you till the sun is just going down, and I would not then, only it is so wrong not to. I wish _you_ had been named Maria, and had to stay here instead of me. 'Your broken-hearted sister, 'MOLLY CARRUTHERS.' When Molly stayed at the White House she was accustomed to read aloud in the mornings from 'Ministering Children' or 'Little Pilgrims,' while Aunt Maria sewed severely. But that morning Aunt Maria did not send for her. 'Your aunt's not well,' Clements told her; 'she won't be down before lunch. Run along, do, miss, and walk in the garden like a young lady.' Molly chose rather to swagger out into the stableyard like a young gentleman. The groom was saddling the sorrel horse.