Page:A Little Country Girl - Coolidge (1887).djvu/187

 just sailing into the drawing-room; shook her dimpled fist at Georgie's back, visible through the open door; and then went to sit with her mother, who also was "not invited."

There is no prettier entertainment than a lunch-party of girls. The flowers, the confections, all the graceful little fripperies of the feast, seem to suit with the bright young faces, to whom daylight is a becoming and not a dangerous test. Frederic had taken great pains in ornamenting the table for his young ladies. There was a nosegay for each guest, and no two nosegays were alike. One was made up of roses and daisies, another of roses and heliotrope, another of roses and violets; and each was tied with a satin ribbon of corresponding color, which had the name of the girl for whom it was intended, and the date, painted in gold letters on the ends. In the middle of the table stood a large square pan of glass, in which floated a mass of water-lilies, pink and white; and winding in and out among the little dishes of crystallized fruits, éclairs, apricots, and hot-house grapes, was a