Page:Carroll Rankin--Dandelion Cottage.djvu/187

 Rh  Laura, who was not invited to the party, and who found time heavy on her hands, watched the girls, after stopping for Marjory, set out in their pretty summer dresses to spend the afternoon at their young friend's house. Laura gazed after them enviously. There was no reason why she should have been invited for she had never met the little girl that was giving the party, but she didn't think of that. Instead, she foolishly laid the unintentional slight at the little cottagers' door.

Mrs. Milligan was sewing on the doorstep and had given Laura a dishtowel to hem. Saying something about hunting for a thimble, Laura went to the kitchen, took the bread-knife from the table drawer, stole quietly out of the back door, and slipped between the bars of the back fence. Reaching the splendid vine that the girls loved so dearly, she parted the huge, rough leaves until she found the spot where the vine started from the ground. First looking