"Miss Pidsley!" Pamela looked surprised at her question. "Oh, nothing.
You see, Miss Hammond goes with us, and—and—well, we all like her; but
Miss Pidsley—I don't know why, but I think we never thought of giving
her anything. I should be afraid to."
The shopping was really great fun; the girls swarmed about the counters and wandered about the shops, going into raptures over this thing and hesitating about buying that thing, until it really seemed as though all the purchases never would be made. Yet by degrees they somehow acquired a great many curious possessions.
Kitty bought a nice pocket-book for her father, a little brooch for Betty, a book for Tony, and a penknife for Anna; but it took so long to decide on these that she left her presents for the servants to get another day, for she still had to buy her flowers for Miss Hammond, and teatime was fast approaching. The flower-shop was perhaps the most fascinating of all; the cut flowers, the ferns, and the plants in the pots were perfectly bewildering in their beauty. Kitty was in raptures, and almost wished she had bought flowers to take home to them all, instead of the things she had got.
"Father would simply love that fern," she cried, "and Betty would go wild over that little white basket with the ferns and hyacinths in it. O Pamela, I do so want it for her! I want them all!"
Pamela had not lost her head as Kitty had. "Well, the hyacinths will have faded long before you go home, Kitty, and the brooch is easier to pack."
Kitty laughed somewhat shamefacedly. Her eye was already caught by a lovely little flowering rose-bush in a pot. "I must buy that," she said with determination, "and I am going to."
"For Miss Hammond? Oh, how nice! Stupid me had never thought of a plant for her. I always get cut flowers for her room."
"It isn't for Miss Hammond," said Kitty rather shyly; "I have bought violets for her. I think I will take the rose back to Miss Pidsley."
"Miss Pidsley! You funny girl, Kitty."
"Well, at any rate I will offer it to her, and if she doesn't like it— she can't hurt me; and it does seem rather hard that she should miss all this, and not have anything taken back to her either. She seems to have all the dull, disagreeable things to do, and none of the nice ones."