"Why does she mind him?" she thought, with languid resentment. "If she was only like Aunt Adelaide! I wonder if she'll remember to tell Miss Carter to get my hot-water bag." Frederica did remember, but she did not tell Miss Carter: she never went into that room in the ell when she could help it. She filled the hot-water bag herself, brought it to Mrs. Payton, suggested bed instead of the big chair, and vanished into the welcome silence of her own room. Later, in the dining-room, as she dreamed over her solitary dinner, she roused herself to tell Flora that she was to go out to the bungalow the next day. "You've got to get up a bully supper for me, Flora. Mr. Maitland is coming." There was no reply, and Frederica looked up. "What's the matter? You got a headache, too?" "I was expecting a friend o' mine would call on me to-morrow night," Flora said, sullenly. Frederica was genuinely concerned. "I'm awfully sorry, but Mr. Maitland is coming to see me and I really _must_ be out there. Can't you put your friend off? Who is he?" Flora looked coy. "Ah, now, Flora," Miss Payton said, good-naturedly, "what's all this? I must look into this!" The teasing banished the gloom for a minute or two. "Send him a little note and tell him you'll be home Saturday night," Fred suggested. She wasn't quite sure of kitchen etiquette on such matters; but, after all, why shouldn't Flora do just what her young mistress was doing? "Maybe he will come to-night," she said, encouragingly, and Flora, with a flicker of hope, said, "Maybe he will; if he does, I guess I'll invite him to go to a movie with me next week." "Perhaps he'll invite you," Fred said. But Flora's hopes did not rise to such a height. "If he doesn't come in to-night, I'll send him a reg'ler written invitation to a movie," she said, happily. CHAPTER XVII As things turned out, Flora might have seen her "friend" in Payton Street Friday night, had devotion prompted him to call, for the festivity at the camp was postponed for three days. The morning mail brought Frederica a brief line from Howard Maitland; he had found, he said, after he left her office, that he had to run on to Philadelphia. Back Monday morning. If her invitation held good, he'd come out to Lakeville for supper Monday night. The letter ended with some scratched-out words, which looked like, "I may have something to tell you--" The obliterated line made her glow! But the delay was disappointing. Three whole days before she could hear that "something" he wanted to tell her--and she wanted to hear! Well, it would give her more time to fix things up in the cottage. With this in view, she and Zip and Flora went out to Lakeville Sunday morning, and Fred had a silent day to keep an eye on the dusting, and work on her suffrage paper, and jolly Flora, whose plaintive dullness was beginning to be rather trying.