"Daisy will have to be her namesake, of course," said Tennessee.
"Jersey can be a mosquito," said Old New York; "she's just the figure for it."
"Thank you!" said Jersey, who weighed ninety pounds. "Going on that theory, Pennsylvania ought to go as an elephant, and Rhode Island as a giraffe."
"And Chicago as a snake--no! I didn't mean that!" cried Maine.
"You said it! you said it!" cried several voices, in triumph.
"The Charitable Organ has called names at last!" said Jersey, laughing. "And she has hit it exactly. Now, Maine, what is the use of looking pained? the girl _is_ a snake--or a sneak, which amounts to the same thing. Let us have truth, I say, at all hazards."
"I am sorry!" said Maine, simply. "I am not fond of Chicago, and that is the very reason why I should not call her names behind her back. It slipped out before I knew it; I am sorry and ashamed, and that is all there is to say. And now, suppose we go home, and tell the other girls about the party."
The Committee trooped off across the hill, laughing and talking, Maine alone grave and silent. As their voices died away, the ferns nodded beside a great pine-tree that stood just within the border of the wood, not six yards from where they had been sitting. A slender dark girl rose from the fern-clump in which she had been crouching, and shook the pine-needles from her dress. Very cautiously she parted the screen of leaves, and looked after the retreating girls.
"That was worth while!" she said; and her voice, though quiet, was full of ugly meaning. "Snakes can hear, Miss Oracle, and bite, too. We'll see about those scarlet leaves!"
Sang Tennessee, as she ran up-stairs. "Oh, Maine, is that you? my dear, my costume is simply too perfect for anything. I've been out in the woods, practising my war-whoop. Three yelps and a screech; I flatter myself it is the _most_ blood-curdling screech you ever heard. I'm going to have a dress-rehearsal now, all by myself. Come and see--why, what's the matter, Maine? something is wrong with you. What is it?"
"Oh! nothing serious," said Maine, trying to speak lightly. "I must get up another costume, that's all, and there isn't much time."
"No! some one has cut or broken every branch. There is not one left. The leaves made the whole costume, you see; it amounts to nothing without them, merely a yellow gown."