"Nan," she said, "if this is really you, let me present my father; and, papa, this is supposed to be Miss Nan Allen, but I never saw her look like this before."

"I am very glad to meet you, Miss Allen," said Mr. Fairfield, "and though we are all apparently very well at present, one can never tell how soon there may be need of your professional services."

"I hope not very soon," said Nan, laughing; "for my professional knowledge is scarcely sufficient to enable me to adjust this costume properly."

"It seems to be on all right," said Patty, looking at it critically; "but where in the world did you get it? And what have you got it on for? We're not going to a masquerade."

"I put it on," said Nan, "because I couldn't help myself. I wanted to change my travelling gown, and when I opened my suit-case this is all there was in it, except some combs and brushes and bottles."

"Whew!" said Bob. "When I picked up that suit-case I wasn't quite sure I had the right one. You know I went back for it after we left the train at New Brunswick, and you said it was the only one in the world with a handle on the end."

"I thought it was," said Nan, "but it seems somebody else was clever enough to have an end-handle too, and she was a trained nurse, apparently."

"Many of the new suit-cases have handles on the end," said Mr. Fairfield, "though not common as yet I have seen a number of them. But just imagine how the nurse feels who is obliged to wear your dinner gown instead of her uniform."

"I hope she won't spoil it," exclaimed b.u.mble. "It was that lovely light blue thing, one of the prettiest frocks you own."

"I can imagine her now," said Bob: "she is probably bathing the brow of a sleepless patient, and the lace ruffles and turquoise bugles are helping along a lot. In fact, I think she's looking rather nice going around a sick-room in that blue bombazine."

"It isn't bombazine, Bob," said his sister; "it's beautiful, lovely light-blue chiffon."

"Well, beautiful, lovely light-blue chiffon, then; but anyway, I'm sure the nurse is glad of a chance to wear it instead of her own plain clothes."

"But her own plain clothes are not at all unpicturesque, and are very becoming to Miss Allen," said Mr. Fairfield. "But haven't your trunks come?" he added, as they all went out to dinner.

"No," said Bob; "Mr. Harper and I investigated the baggage-room, but they weren't there."

"Oh, call him Kenneth," said Patty. "You boys are too young for such formality."

"I may be," said Bob, "but he isn't. He's a college man."

"He's a college boy," said Patty; "he's only nineteen, and you're sixteen yourself."

"Going on seventeen," said Bob proudly, "and so is b.u.mble."

"Twins often are the same age," observed Mr. Fairfield, "and after a few years, Bob, you'll have to be careful how you announce your own age, because it will reveal your sister's."

"Pooh! I don't care," said b.u.mble. "I'd just as lieve people would know how old I am. Nan is twenty-two, and she doesn't care who knows it."

"You look about fifty in those ridiculous clothes," said Patty.

"Do I?" said Nan, quite unconcernedly. "I don't mind that a bit, but I don't think I can keep them at this stage of whiteness for many days.

Can anything be done to coax our trunks this way?"

"We might do some telephoning after dinner," said Mr. Fairfield. "What is the situation up to the present time?"

"Why, you see it was this way," said b.u.mble. "When the carriage came to take us to the station, the trunks weren't quite ready, and mamma said for us to go on and she'd finish packing them and send them down in time to get that train or the next."

"And did they come for that train?"

"No, they didn't, and so, of course, they must have been sent on the next one; but even so, they ought to be here now, because, you know, we went on through and came back."

"But how did you get your checks if your trunks weren't put on the train?"

"Oh, the baggageman knows us," explained Bob, "and he gave us our checks and kept the duplicates to put on our trunks when they came down to the station. He often does that."

"Yes," said b.u.mble, "we've never had our trunks ready yet when the man came for them."

"Nan's was ready," put in Bob, who was a great stickler for justice, "but, of course, hers couldn't go till ours did. Oh, I guess they'll turn up all right."

They did turn up all right twenty-four hours later, but the exchange of suit-cases was not so easily effected.

However, after more or less correspondence between Nan and the nurse who owned the uniform, the transfer was finally made, and Nan recovered her pretty blue gown, which certainly bore no evidence of having been worn in a sickroom.

"But I bet she wore it, all the same," said Bob. "She probably neglected her patient and went to a party that night just because she had the frock."

CHAPTER XXI

A GOOD SUGGESTION

August at Boxley Hall proved to be a month of fun and frolic. The Barlow cousins were much easier to entertain than the St. Clairs. In fact, they entertained themselves, and as for Nan Allen, she entertained everybody with whom she came in contact. Mr. Fairfield expressed himself as being delighted to have Patty under the influence of such a gracious and charming young woman, and Aunt Alice quite agreed with him. Marian adored Nan, and though she liked b.u.mble very much indeed, she took more real pleasure in the society of the older girl.

But they were a congenial crowd of merry young people, and when Mr.

Hepworth came down from the city, as he often did, and Kenneth Harper drifted in from next-door, as he very often did, the house party at Boxley Hall waxed exceeding merry.

And there was no lack of social entertainment. The Vernondale young people were quite ready to provide pleasures for Patty's guests, and the appreciation shown by Nan and the Barlows was a decided and very pleasant contrast to the att.i.tude of Ethelyn and Reginald.

Sailing parties occurred often, and these Nan enjoyed especially, for she was pa.s.sionately fond of the water, and dearly loved sailing or rowing.

The Tea Club girls all liked Nan, and though she was older than most of them, she enjoyed their meetings quite as much as b.u.mble, Marian, or Patty herself.

Bob soon made friends with the "Tea Club Annex," as the boys of Patty's set chose to call themselves. Though not a club of any sort, they were always invited when the Tea Club had anything special going on, and many times when it hadn't.

One afternoon the Tea Club was holding its weekly meeting at Marian's.

"Do you know," Elsie Morris was saying, "that the Babies' Hospital is in need of funds again? Those infants are perfect gormandisers. I don't see how they can eat so much or wear so many clothes."

"Babies always wear lots of clothes," said Lillian Desmond, with an air of great wisdom. "I've seen them; they just bundle them up in everything they can find, and then wrap more things around them."

"Well, they've used up all their wrappings," said Elsie Morris, "and they want more. I met Mrs. Greenleaf this morning in the street, and she stopped me to ask if we girls wouldn't raise some more money for them somehow."

"Oh, dear!" said Florence Dougla.s.s. "They just want us to work all the time for the old hospital; I'm tired of it."

"Why, Florence!" said Patty. "We haven't done a thing since we had that play last winter. I think it would be very nice to have some entertainment or something and make some money for them again. We could have some summery outdoorsy kind of a thing like a lawn party, you know."