Soon after tea Polly was sent home in the coach, with a box of eleven long-stemmed superb pink roses, a birthday present from Leonora. She ran into the living-room to show them to her father and mother, but stopped just inside the threshold, staring at the corner where a low bookcase had stood. There, shining with newness, she saw a handsome upright piano. "Why, father," she cried, "what made you do it? You said you couldn't afford one just yet, and I could have waited as well as not!" Dr. Dudley smiled down into her eager face. "I didn't," he answered. "We were as much surprised as you are. Read that!" pointing to a card tilted against the music rack. She snatched the bit of white. To Polly, with all the love and happy birthday wishes that can be packed into a piano. From her friend, JULIET P. JOCELYN. Polly drew a long breath of joy. "Isn't it lovely!" she beamed. The next minute her fingers were racing over the keys in a musical little waltz. Early the next morning came David with a "Little Colonel" book for Polly. "I didn't know whether to bring it over yesterday or not," he laughed; "but I finally thought I'd better wait for the intermediate day." "It wouldn't make any difference," returned Polly, fingering the book admiringly. "Thank you ever and ever so much! I've wanted to know more about the 'Little Colonel.' But what kind of a day did you call it?" "Intermediate," he replied. "Isn't that right?" "Of course," she assured him promptly, always secretly marveling at David's ability to use words with which she was unfamiliar. "It sounds beautiful." "It means halfway between, I think," he explained; "so I thought it was an appropriate word." "It is," declared Polly, "a great deal better than just between. It makes it seem more important." David laughed, and then, spying the piano, admired Polly's new instrument to her full satisfaction, and ended by sitting down and singing a little song which she called "another birthday present." Shortly before two o'clock the birthday guests began to arrive at Mrs. Jocelyn's beautiful home. The two mothers, one in white and the other in gray, and the two girls, dressed exactly alike in soft white wool, with pink sashes and ribbons, received informally in the east drawing-room, and when the girls and boys were all there Mrs. Dudley started a game. They were in the midst of the fun, when Polly, glancing at Ilga Barron, was troubled to see an ugly scowl. The children were in a circle, alternate girls and boys, secretly passing a ring from hand to hand, and it chanced that Ilga had a place between Otto Kriloff and Cornelius O'Shaughnessy. "Oh, if she makes a fuss!" thought Polly, and straightway the charm of the game vanished.