She stretched now to her full length between her scented sheets. “I do wish the dawn would hurry up and dawn!” she thought. “The minute it’s a bit light enough I’ll get up, take a cold bath, dress, and get out into the orchard. If fairies are there, dawn ought to be as easy a time to see them as any. I’ll keep my promise about the key. But I’ve a perfect right in the orchard.”
She fell asleep then and dreamed about the orchard house. The King of the Fairies was there, waiting for her on the doorstep. She sat down beside him and at once began to see things different, to see them, as the King of the Fairies said, “whole.” There was a lot to the dream—colour, adventure, and music, and above all, the sight of things “whole.” But Kate, when she woke, had quite lost it. The dream had become just tag ends of brightness left floating in her mind.
* * * * * * * *
To her surprise morning was fully established, birds were singing in high chorus, and water was running loudly into the tub!
Bertha appeared in the bathroom door. “Miss Elsie got ahead of us,” she informed Kate brightly. “She must have been quieter than a mouse to have had her bath and all and not waked you. Now I suppose she’s out in the orchard or somewhere. It’s a beautiful day.”
Oh, well, Kate did not allow herself to be downcast at having missed dawn in the orchard. Not a bit of it. What a day it was to be! The frock, “The Blue Bird,” the whole day in Boston with Elsie, and Aunt Katherine so friendly!
At her place at the little breakfast table under the peach tree she found a letter from her mother. She snatched it up and tore it open, hoping she could get at least the heart out of it before Aunt Katherine and Elsie should appear.
But she had hardly read the first sentence before Miss Frazier came out through the breakfast-room and Elsie floated from the direction of the orchard. Kate was too absorbed to be aware of the approach of either until she heard Elsie exclaim, “Letters! Oh, is there one for me?”
Aunt Katherine’s tone was surprisingly sharp when she answered, “You never get letters, Elsie. You have hardly had one in the last year.”
“That’s unfair,” Kate thought hotly. “Aunt thinks she’s jealous even of my mail. And all the time she’s probably expecting an answer to that special delivery she sent yesterday.”