“Now we are ready for you, so bring on your flowers,” said Molly to the boys, as she and Merry added their store of baskets to the gay show Jill had set forth on the long table ready for the evening's work.
“They wouldn't let me see one, but I guess they have had good luck, they look so jolly,” answered Jill, looking at Gus, Frank, and Jack, who stood laughing, each with a large basket in his hands.
“Fair to middling. Just look in and see;” with which cheerful remark Gus tipped up his basket and displayed a few bits of green at the bottom.
“I did better. Now, don't all scream at once over these beauties;” and Frank shook out some evergreen sprigs, half a dozen saxifrages, and two or three forlorn violets with hardly any stems.
“I don't brag, but here's the best of all the three,” chuckled Jack, producing a bunch of feathery carrot-tops, with a few half-shut dandelions trying to look brave and gay.
“Oh, boys, is that all?”
“What shall we do?”
“We've only a few house-flowers, and all those baskets to fill,” cried the girls, in despair; for Merry's contribution had been small, and Molly had only a handful of artificial flowers “to fill up,” she said.
“It isn't our fault: it is the late spring. We can't make flowers, can we?” asked Frank, in a tone of calm resignation.
“Couldn't you buy some, then?” said Molly, smoothing her crumpled morning-glories, with a sigh.