Maggie was too shy to speak out as many children would have done, and to say,—
"That was my plan, Miss Ashton. I was the first one to think of that;" and she sat with her color changing, and her eyes fixed wonderingly and reproachfully on Hattie as she spoke, feeling somehow as if she had been wronged, and yet not exactly seeing the way to right herself.
"Oh! that would be delightful," said Gracie. "Miss Ashton, do you think you could let us do it?"
"Well, I might," said Miss Ashton. "That is not a bad idea, Hattie. I will talk to my mother about it and see what she thinks, and you may all tell your friends at home, and learn if they approve."
"If we could have the fair on your piazza," continued Hattie eagerly, "we could dress it up very prettily with wreaths and flowers, and we could make a kind of a bower at one end, and choose one of the girls for a queen, and let it be her throne-room, and there we could have the flower-table. Some of the children told me you always let them have a festival before vacation, Miss Ashton; and we might put it off till a little later, so that it would be warm and pleasant, and we should have plenty of flowers."
There was not one of the children who did not raise her voice in favor of the new plan except Nellie Ransom, who sat opposite to Maggie, and who watched her changing face, and looked from her to Hattie with inquiring and rather suspicious looks.
Lily clapped her hands, and almost sprang from her seat.
"I'll begin to work for the fair this very evening!" she said. "No more of your putting off for me. I'll bring down mamma's ribbon-box and worsted-box, if she'll let me, and ask her what I can have, and to-morrow I'll ask her to let me make something."
"And we'll ask mamma and Aunt Annie, won't we, Maggie?" said Bessie; "and Belle, we'll ask them for some things for you too."
Bessie received no answer from Maggie, who, feeling as if the whole matter had been taken out of her hands, poor child, and as if she had been robbed of her property, dared not speak, lest she should burst into tears.