"Are you sure you're on the right track?"
"You'll see if I'm not!" replied Ellen.
"Well, all I say is," he went on, condescendingly, "you've hit upon a capital scheme; and you may bet your boots on it that I won't do anything to spoil it."
The girl looked down at her strong but shapely shoes (she was a bit vain of her neat foot), and thought that she would not be so unladylike as to 'bet her boots' on anything. But, as Will's observation was entirely impersonal, and intended as a pledge that he would follow her instructions, she made no comment. Moreover, she had now brought about the state of affairs which she had mischievously designed. Each of the party except Joe supposed that he or she had a secret with Ellen which the others knew nothing about; to each she had whispered her conjecture regarding Joe's purpose, and planned that they, the two of them, should please him by joining in it, without intimating their intention to him or any one. What a general astonishment and amusement there would be when it came out that all had known what each had been enjoying as a secret!
Meantime they had been active, and each had gathered a fair quantity of pretty flowers—arbutus, violets, anemones, and cherry blooms; to which Teresa and Elsie insisted upon adding buttercups and even dandelions. Now the sun was going down, and they gaily turned their steps toward home.
III.
"A happy May-day!" the children called to one another the next morning, as they set out, at a very early hour, upon their pleasant round of floral gift-leaving. Before doing so, however, each had held a special conference with Ellen.
"Yes, I've managed it. Won't everybody be surprised?" she quietly agreed again and again. And yet how surprised everybody would be only sportive Ellen knew.
At half-past seven they reassembled for breakfast, which Elsie and Will took with their cousins. What a comparing of notes there was during the meal! Teresa had been caught hanging a basket at her little friend, Mollie Emerson's. Will's mother had seen him dodging round the corner after fastening one on the front gate for her.
"O Joe! what did you do with that beautiful basket you arranged with so much care,—the large one with the freshest flowers, I mean?" asked Frances, with an ingenious air.