Friday afternoon brought Polly, who appeared promptly in her dowdy little cloth jacket, ugly plaid skirt and shabby hat.
"Oh, me," said Teddy as she saw her coming, "if we only dared to furbish her up a bit. Miss Thurston will never see her possibilities in those clothes. Do you suppose she would object to my lending her a hat?"
"I'm afraid she would," said Janet. "You know how she was about the sunbonnet, and it was all I could do to get her to wear that fichu of mine. If we hadn't made an obvious point of borrowing all sorts of things from one another, she'd never have let us lend her all we did for the calico party."
"I'll try, anyhow," said Teddy; "she can do no more than refuse." So when Polly entered, she said coaxingly: "Don't you know, Polly dear, that is a very unbecoming hat? Please don't be offended at my mentioning it; Janet and I always tell each other when either wears anything unbecoming. Won't you let me lend you one of my hats just for to-day, so Miss Thurston will see you at your best? Janet and I often exchange in that way. If you will lend me yours, I will lend you mine."
But Polly, who knew that her rusty out-of-date black felt was no match for the stylish plumed affair that Teddy poised on her hand, said a little stiffly: "Thank you very much, Teddy, but I prefer to wear my own hat." Then the red came to her cheeks. "Please don't think I—I am unappreciative of your kindness. I realize that it is really heroic for you to offer to appear in my hat, but I am used to it, and I don't mind, while you couldn't help feeling awkward and queer in it. I should be unhappy if I allowed you to wear it." Then whimsically: "Besides, I can't see it when it is on my own head, and if I had it before me on yours, I'd realize more than ever what a horror it is, and I'd never be able to put it on again with any tolerance of it. So don't try to make me any more dissatisfied with it than I am."
"That settles it," said Janet. "You are a dear philosophical thing, Polly. Come along and never mind your hat."
It is true that Miss Thurston looked a little disappointed when Polly was presented to her, but when Janet had tweaked off the girl's hat and Polly had removed her ill-fitting jacket, she smiled appreciatively.
"Do you think I will do?" asked Polly, an anxious expression in her lovely eyes, for she had been quick to note that first glance of disapproval.
"Do, my dear? Why, of course," replied Miss Thurston. "If you can hold your pose well, I shall be more than satisfied. I have a lot of costumes here and I am sure I can adapt them to your figure. Let me see." She brought out a hat whose elegance announced that it was the creation of no ordinary milliner.
Janet recognized it at once as being one of Becky's favorite pieces of head-gear, and when Miss Thurston set it upon Polly's head both Janet and Edna exclaimed: "Isn't she too lovely for anything in that?"