“I see there is to be no time wasted,” said Dr. Trenire.  “You are a business-like young person, Betty.”

“Yes,” said Betty, with satisfaction.  “You see, I can’t do anything until I have them; and if they are going to be bought, they may as well be bought quickly.”

“Your logic is admirable; but, dear, why didn’t you speak to me about it before?  It would have been much better than pretending to obey your aunt all these weeks, and deceiving her.”

Betty looked ashamed.  To have the word “deceive” used about herself without any glossing of it over made her feel very small and mean.

“We did think of it, father,” she said earnestly; “but Kitty said she didn’t want to seem to be always complaining about Aunt Pike.”

“I see,” said Dr. Trenire quietly, and he gazed for a moment gravely into the fire before he left the room.

Betty never knew what passed between her father and her aunt; but she heard no more about the gray stockings, and she wrote off delightedly to Kitty to tell her all about it.

Kitty was out when the letter came.  It was the day on which the girls were taken for an afternoon’s shopping or sight-seeing.

“I really must get some presents to take home to them all,” she had said quite seriously to Pamela in the morning.

Pamela laughed.  “There are eleven more weeks to do it in,” she said.

But Kitty covered her ears.  “Don’t, don’t,” she cried—­“just when I have been telling myself that time is flying, and that I haven’t many more chances.”

“Well, you haven’t many,” laughed Pamela.  “Of course we don’t go every week.  I think you are wise, though, to get your things while you have the money, and if you see things later that you like better you mustn’t mind.”

“I shall keep my eyes turned away from the shops,” said Kitty.  “Now be quiet, Pamela, while I make my list.”

“Mine is ready,” said Pamela, with something between a laugh and a sigh, and she held up a blank sheet.

“Haven’t you any one to get anything for?” said Kitty sympathetically, sorry At once that she had talked so much about herself.  “Poor Pamela!”

“Only Miss Hammond,” said Pamela.  “We generally give her some flowers—­ most of us do, at least.  Rhoda Collins doesn’t; she says it seems such a waste of money, as flowers fade so soon.  I suggested one day that she should give Miss Hammond a cake instead, as that at any rate was useful.”

“And did she?”

“No; she said one couldn’t get anything very nice for a penny.”

Kitty tittered.  “Flowers for Miss Hammond,” she wrote on her list.  “What do you give to Miss Pidsley?”

“Miss Pidsley!” Pamela looked surprised at her question.  “Oh, nothing.  You see, Miss Hammond goes with us, and—­and—­well, we all like her; but Miss Pidsley—­I don’t know why, but I think we never thought of giving her anything.  I should be afraid to.”