In truth, she was tired but she would not say so.  It pleased her far better to find fault with Inez.

“When you get rested,” she said, “we might climb up onto your barn and crawl into the cupola.”

“Ye’ll not be doin’ that, young lady,” said the gardener, who, as he was passing, had heard what she had said.  “It’s not safe, an’ I know Mr. Varney’d not allow it.”

“Horrid old thing!” said Gwen.  “Who do you mean?” Inez asked, sharply.

“The gardener, of course,” snapped Gwen.

“I guess I’ll go home,” she said, a moment later, and although Inez coaxed her, she would not remain nor would she say why she had decided to go.

Whenever she wearied of a place she left it, refusing to remain or explain why she would not stay.  Inez looked after the little flying figure.

“I hate to have her go, but I couldn’t run every minute,” she said.

One sunny afternoon, Lena and Rob, Leslie and Harry were sitting on the lawn, listening to Polly’s story of floating in a little boat out to the open sea.  Of how she and Rose did not dream how naughty the boy, Donald, had been until they were so far out that they could hardly see the beach.

The boys thought it very exciting, and this was not the first time that they had heard it.  Indeed, they had often asked her to tell it, and each time they had found it as interesting as when they first had listened to it.

“Now tell us about the first moment that you saw the Dolphin,” said Rob.

Gwen Harcourt, seeing the group on the lawn, wondered what they were talking about.

There was but one way to find out, and she chose to take it.  She ran up the path that led to where the little group was sitting and dropped on the grass beside Harry Grafton.

She listened to the story, but she did not think it at all amusing.

Anyone who knew Gwen would know that it could not interest her.  She cared for no story of which she was not the heroine.

When the tale was finished and the playmates were telling Polly how fine a story it was, Gwen, speaking very loudly, made herself heard; she usually did.

“Everybody listen while I tell a story that’ll scare you ’till you most can’t breathe.  It’s a true story, too!”

“Go ahead, Gwen,” said Rob.

“Yes, tell it!” said Harry.  “I don’t mind being scared if you can do it!”

She needed no urging.

“One time when I was little—–­” she commenced, but Harry interrupted.

“When was that?” he asked.

“Stop, Harry!” whispered Leslie.

“One time, when I was Littler than I am now, I went into our parlor all alone when it was almost dark, and looked at the pictures.  Mama has ever so many, and some of them are landscapes and some of them are portraits.

“The one I liked to look at scared me every time I saw it.  It was a big, tall lady dressed in yellow and she had a feather fan.