"Oh, my dear, her wardrobe is beyond description. She absolutely wanted to come to poor Gwin's quiet little tea party in a dress fit for a ball, flounced and frilled and laced and ribboned, and with a train to it, absolutely a train, although she is not fifteen yet." Bessie could not help laughing. "I am sorry she is fond of dress," she answered; "I can't bear that sort of girl." "Oh, you'll positively loathe her, Bessie. I quite pity you at the thought of having to walk with her this afternoon." "My dear Alice, we must make the best of it," answered Bessie, "and I don't suppose she will quite kill me; she will be amusing at any rate." "Amusing enough to those who have not got to live with her day and night," answered Alice in a very discontented voice. "Oh, and here she comes," she added; "and, look, she is running and racing down the road and waving her hands to us. Oh, Bessie, it is intolerable! Don't you pity me?" "What! is that the girl?" cried Bessie. "How very--" "How very what?" asked Alice. "How very pretty she is!" "Pretty," said Alice in a tone of such withering scorn that Bessie could not help gazing at her friend in astonishment. CHAPTER IV. TIFFS ALL AROUND. Kitty's dark-blue skirt was all that was correct and proper; it reached just to her ankles, and her remarkably small and beautifully-shaped feet were encased in the neatest possible tan boots. But the blouse of light pink silk, all bedizened with bunches of ribbons and lappets of lace, was in Alice's eyes almost as painfully unsuitable as the trained skirt. Kitty wore a little close-fitting cap of dark-blue velvet on her head. Her hair, of the softest, cloudiest black, true Irish hair, was piled up in a thick mass behind; in front it waved and curled round her white forehead. Kitty was very tall, and, child as she still was in years, had a more formed figure than most girls of her age. She was drawing on her tan gloves now, and unfurling a parasol of tussore silk with a heavy lace fall. "I do hope I'm smart enough," she said, panting slightly as she spoke. "Is this one of your schoolfellows?" "Yes; my friend, Miss Challoner." "Haven't you got a Christian name?" asked Kitty, staring frankly with her wide-open eyes at Alice's friend. "Bessie is my name," answered Bessie Challoner. "Do you mind my calling it to you? I like Challoner awfully, and if I were to say Challoner without the Miss it might do, but Miss is so stiff. I hope I may be Kitty to you, and then you won't object to being Bessie to me." "Not a bit," answered Bessie heartily; "but we are a little late, and had better walk on as fast as we can." Gwin Harley lived in a beautiful house about two miles away, and the girls turned down a path which led across some fields in the direction of Harley Grove. The time of year was toward the end of May, and the weather was perfect.