Page:My Dear Cornelia (1924).pdf/148

 president of your company which railroad to buy next, you have to take it out in sending Oliver back to the city in disgrace because he has had Dorothy's hair bobbed."

"How I hate him!" cried Cornelia, as if still nursing the bitterness of defeat.

"Really?" I asked, in a momentary flutter of hope.

"But if queens feel as miserable as I do," she added, "since I have had to discipline him, I don't wish to be a queen."

"You have no choice," I murmured.

"But here comes the mail," she exclaimed, rising suddenly and putting on her hat. "Come! Let's go and meet it."

My secret hope sank like a stone into cold depths of resignation.

"All right," I assented sadly; "but why such eagerness for the mail this morning?"

"Why, I am hoping," she lilted, "I am hoping, of course, for a letter from Oliver, you idiot!"