"Lavinia," went on Miss Flint, unmoved by her niece's words, "I am more pained than I can tell you at your unkindness to me to-day." "Aunty," said Ladybird, solemnly, "I was more pained than I can tell you at your unkindness to me to-day." "But," said Miss Priscilla, "you must realize, my child, that I am older than you are, and know more." "But, aunty," said Ladybird, "you must realize that I am younger than you are, and care more." "Care more for what?" said Miss Priscilla. "For red spots," said Ladybird. "Of course I know, Aunt Priscilla, that you have a right to say what kind of horrid old clothes I shall wear; but it seems to me, if I had a little girl to look after, and she wanted to wear red spots, I'd let her wear them. It wouldn't kill anybody, you know." "Priscilla," said Miss Dorinda, "I think the child is right." "I'm not aware, Dorinda," said the elder Miss Flint, "that I asked your opinion concerning our niece's conduct." "No," said Miss Dorinda, humbly. "Aunty," said Ladybird, still refusing to be pushed from her position on the old lady's lap, and still with her arms clasped about Miss Priscilla's stately, if withered, neck, "aunty, are red spots wicked?" "Not that I know of," said Priscilla Flint. "Then don't you think, aunty, that you might as well have let me keep them, in the first place? Then I wouldn't have pasted them on your dress; then I wouldn't have been naughty; and then everything would be lovely, and the goose hang high," concluded Ladybird, with an airy, careless gesture of her thin, brown, little paws. "Ladybird," said Miss Priscilla, and her voice softened as she used the more endearing title, "I am not sure but that you are right in this case. There is no sin in bright colors, and if you want them, I suppose there is no real reason why you should not have them. I am sorry for my part of this unfortunate episode. I was unjust--" "Never mind, aunty," said Ladybird, clasping her arms tighter round the old lady's throat and kissing her hard, "I was unjust, too, I was naughty, and I was a bad, bad girl, and I--that is, we're both sorry, aren't we?" "Yes," said Miss Priscilla Flint, "we're both sorry, and I will get you a new red dress." "Do," said Ladybird, cheerfully: "and get yourself a new black silk one, won't you, aunty?" CHAPTER IX DOING RIGHT Ladybird hated school. Not the lessons, they were learned quickly enough, and with but little study; but the out-of-doors child grew very restive in the restraint and confinement of the school-room, and her whole touch-and-go nature rebelled at the enforced routine. Many battles were fought before she consented to go at all; but though Ladybird was strong-willed, Miss Priscilla Flint was also of no pliable nature, and she finally succeeded in convincing her fractious niece that education was desirable as well as inevitable.