taken that way sometimes. Miss Avery hates us all like poison ever since her frightful dust-up with Evie."
"I hadn't heard of that," said Margaret. A visit from Dolly had its compensations.
"Didn't you know she gave Evie a present last August, and Evie returned it, and then—oh, goloshes! You never read such a letter as Miss Avery wrote."
"But it was wrong of Evie to return it. It wasn't like her to do such a heartless thing."
"But the present was so expensive."
"Why does that make any difference, Dolly?"
"Still, when it costs over five pounds—I didn't see it, but it was a lovely enamel pendant from a Bond Street shop. You can't very well accept that kind of thing from a farm woman. Now, can you?"
"You accepted a present from Miss Avery when you were married."
"Oh, mine was old earthenware stuff—not worth a halfpenny. Evie's was quite different. You'd have to ask anyone to the wedding who gave you a pendant like that. Uncle Percy and Albert and father and Charles all said it was quite impossible, and when four men agree, what is a girl to do? Evie didn't want to upset the old thing, so thought a sort of joking letter best, and returned the pendant straight to the shop to save Miss Avery trouble."
"But Miss Avery said—"
Dolly's eyes grew round. "It was a perfectly awful letter. Charles said it was the letter of a madman. In the end she had the pendant back again from the shop and threw it into the duckpond."
"Did she give any reasons?"
"We think she meant to be invited to Oniton, and so climb into society."
"She's rather old for that," said Margaret pensively. "May not she have given the present to Evie in remembrance of her mother?"
"That's a notion. Give every one their due, eh? Well, I suppose I ought to be toddling. Come along, Mr.
