Umé looked doubtful. After a moment she said, "I could never have put them in that vase; it would have looked wrong from the first. But I ran away from my koto practice to-day, perhaps that was just as bad." It was Tei's turn to look surprised. "How could you do it?" she asked in horror. "All the gods will talk about you." Umé shook her head. "It was not hard to do it," she said, "and it is true that I have not thought about it in this whole beautiful day. I do not understand why." "It is because there have been so many other things to think about," said Tei; but she went home and told her mother that she thought Umé would feel the displeasure of the gods because of her disobedience. As for Umé, she said nothing about it at first. Her father was at home and the little girl slipped out of her clogs and into the room like a gay butterfly. "I have returned, honorable Father," she said, fluttering to her knees and spreading her kimono sleeves as widely as they would go above her head. At the same time she bobbed the saucy little head upon a mat. Once would have been quite enough, but Umé did it several times. "That will do," said her father at last. He saw that the child was excited. Umé's grandmother saw it also and spoke reprovingly. "Little girls should never behave in a way to draw the honorable eyes of their parents upon them in displeasure," she said. But Umé had discovered the tray of gifts standing on the floor. There were several packages, each neatly wrapped in white paper with a bit of writing on it, and tied with red and white paper ribbons. Before she touched them Umé made a deep bow before her grandmother, saying, "Truly, thanks!" Then to her father she said, "O Chichi San, have I your generous permission to open the packages?" The permission was given and happy little Umé knelt on the floor beside the tray and opened one package after another. From every one she took first a tiny piece of dried fish wrapped in colored paper, which is nearly always given with a present in Japan. "These are for good luck," she said, and placed the bits of fish carefully in a little lacquered box. Of course there was the envelope of paper handkerchiefs from her grandmother. There was also a beautiful new kimono from her mother, and from her father there was a hairpin with white plum blossoms for ornament. Tara gave her a doll dressed in a kimono like her own new one. "I kept it in the godown for a whole week of days," he told her. "Yes," said the mother softly, "and it was not very hard to make such a small kimono secretly." "I shall call her Haru," said Umé, "because she has come to me in the first days of the honorable springtime." "On the day that I brought the hairpin home and hid it in your mother's sleeve," said her father with a smile, "I felt deeply deceitful." Suddenly Umé felt very unhappy. She looked at all the loving faces and remembered that she, too, had this very day been most deceitful.