“Come on up, girls,” called out Cora.  “But please don’t ask me to move.  I’m in the most delicious heap.”

“Exactly that!” exclaimed Isabel, who looked particularly pretty in a soft-blue summer gown, while Elizabeth was like some flower, in deep-pink muslin.  “You do get into the most awful heaps, Cora, dear.  But you never can rest without relaxing, and to do that—­”

“Belle!” exclaimed Cora, “that is precisely why you never rest—­you never relax your brain.  You’re always thinking of resting and not doing it.”

Bess sank into a wicker chair and smothered the cushions.  Bess was stout—­“when she sat down,” as Cora expressed it.

“Got your car ordered yet?” asked the hostess, passing around the box of chocolates.  Neither girl could resist them.

“Oh, no,” answered Belle.  “Poor papa is in the greatest muddle.  Every one in New City seems to have the best car to sell, and, as he wants a good one, he doesn’t know which one to select.”

“Why not ask Jack?” suggested Cora.  “He’s had lots of experience.”

“Just what I proposed,” replied Belle.  “You, know how queer poor, dear papa is.  He really dislikes motors.”

“Seen Ida lately?” asked Bess.

“Not a sight of her,” answered Cora.  “I was hoping you might bring some news—­not particularly about her, though, but some news.  I am just pining for a real, choice bit.”

She passed the chocolates again.  Bess took one, but her sister shook her head.

“Well, as to news,” remarked Bess, “we have heard that Sid Wilcox has a new machine.”

This was news indeed, after what that youth had said to Cora that very day.  Or had he been only fooling her?

“A new one,” repeated Cora vaguely, trying to, gather her thoughts.

“Brand, spick—­span new,” went on Bess.  “We haven’t seen it, you know, but we’ve heard that it is a beauty.”

“What extravagance!” murmured Cora,—­still busily thinking.  “His runabout isn’t very old.  I wonder where he gets all his money?”

“Don’t you remember he said he had some to invest in the new issue of bank stock?” suggested Belle.

“But the bank wouldn’t let him subscribe,” added her sister.

“What did he do with his other car—­the one that was broken in the collision?” asked Cora.

“Maybe he—­pawned it,” suggested Belle, who had rather vague ideas concerning pawnshops.

“Very likely he would if he could.”  This from Cora with a light laugh.  “I guess Sid is very fond of a change—­and excitement.”  She thought of her experience with him.

“Even a change of girls,” commented Belle.

“Aula Allen told me that he and Ida were `on the outs.’”

“Indeed!” and Cora raised her pretty eyebrows.  “I fancied he was too—­too convenient a friend for Ida to drop.  But my dears, as our English teacher says, I have something more important to discuss than Ida Giles and Sidney Wilcox.  I’m going to have a `doings,’ as I used to call them.”