"Please tie this for me, Patty," she said. "I cannot manage it myself, and get it on quick before Uncle Fred sees me."
"But I am so glad to see you, my dear Bumble," said Mr. Fairfield, "that even that piece of pretty blue ribbon can't make me any gladder."
Bumble smiled back at him in her winning way, and Patty tied her cousin's hair-ribbon with a decided feeling of relief that in all other respects Bumble's costume was tidy and complete.
"Where's Nan?" she inquired; "isn't she ready yet?"
"Why, it's the funniest thing," said Bumble, "I tapped at her door as I came by, but she told me to go on and not wait for her, she would come down in a few minutes."
Just as Pansy appeared to announce dinner, Nan did come down, and Patty stared at her in amazement. Bob whistled, and Bumble exclaimed:
"Well, for goodness gracious sakes! What are you up to now?"
For Nan, instead of wearing the pretty gown which Bumble knew she had brought in her suitcase, was garbed in the complete costume of a trained nurse. A white piqué skirt and linen shirt-waist of immaculate and starched whiteness, an apron with regulation shoulder-straps, and a cap that betokened a graduate of St. Luke's Hospital, formed her surprising, but not at all unbecoming, outfit.
Nan's roguish face looked very demure under the white cap, and she smiled pleasantly when Patty at last recovered her wits sufficiently to introduce her father.
"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."