"O, Isa, I believe she's the Witch of Endor."
"Now, Grace Clifford, I'll tell you how Cassy slanders you, only you can't make me say where I heard it. A forward little miss, she says, you are, always speaking up when you aren't spoken to. Mighty grand you feel. Right vain of your hair, she says; but it's not auburn—it's fire-red."
"Why, Isa Harrington," cried Grace, breathless with surprise, "Panoria Swan has fire-red hair. I'll leave it to you—does it look a speck like mine?"
"Dear me, no, indeed, Gracie. Nobody ever dreamed of such an idea but just Cassy. But that's not all, nor half. She says her ma don't like her to go with you so much. There, that's all I'll tell."
"Isa Harrington, I can't believe one word of that last part," said
Grace, indignantly; "it's a mistake, and you may take it back."
"I can't take back the sober, solemn, honest truth," returned Isa, firmly.
"Seems to me Cassy's changed amazingly, then," said Grace, with a quivering voice.
"Hasn't she seemed rather odder since the oyster party, Gracie? I mean
Mrs. Hallock?"
"Why, no," said Grace, hesitating; "no, indeed! Let me see: once or twice she wouldn't let Cassy go home with me farther than the acorn-tree; but that was because she must have her mind the baby.—Here we are at home."
Grace was not ready to believe that her friend and her friend's mother were both so treacherous; still, she entered the house in a state of much perplexity.