"Oh, we can't help wondering what it will be like, and just when it will be," Princess Polly said, her hands tightly clasped and her eyes bright with excitement.

"It's a lovely place to stay in, even if there wasn't a single thing planned for amusement, but when you know there'll be ever so many good times happening during the Summer, it makes us wild to start for Cliffmore."

The sound of footsteps running made them turn, just as Gwen Harcourt came racing toward them.

She was a little neighbor, so bold, so regardless of the feelings of others, so apt to tell outrageous stories, that Polly and Rose were not fond of her. She never stopped to question if she were welcome, but entered any house where the door stood open, and at once made herself quite at home, always remaining until she chose to go.

She was evidently quite excited. Her short, curling hair blew about her face, and her cheeks were red.

"What do you think?" she cried. "I've just come from that big house over there, where the people have just moved in. I couldn't tell if I'd like to know them, unless I went when I could see them, so this morning I went right up to the door, and as it wasn't locked, I opened it, and went in."

"Why, Gwen Harcourt!" Rose exclaimed.

"Well, what?" Gwen said pertly.

"S'pose I was going to wait and wonder what those people were like? I guess not. I went right straight in and looked at them, so now I know.

"The lady isn't much to look at, and she wasn't dressed up the least bit, and the baby that the nursemaid was holding was awful homely.

"Its face was red, and its hair was sort of straight and stringy, and when it cried, and that was most all the time I was there, it made a perfectly horrid face.

"There's a boy there, too, and I didn't like him very well," she continued. "He talked to me some, but he wants to do all the talking, and I don't like that. I want to talk most of the time, myself."

Polly and Rose managed not to laugh.

"Perhaps if you had been willing to listen, and let him talk more, you might have liked him better," Polly said.

"No, I wouldn't!" Gwen said, stoutly, "for what little he did say made me mad. Think how rude he was! When I told him my whole truly name was Gwendolen Armitage Harcourt, he just said:

"'H'm! Is that so? Well, my name is Jona Jonathan Ebenezer Montgomery, and that beats your name all hollow.' The lady laughed, but she said: 'Don't tease the little girl. That is not your name at all. Why not tell her what your real name is?'

"He didn't do it. He just said: 'Oh, bother!' and ran out doors. I didn't like the boy, but the big room seemed duller after he went out, so after a while I slipped out, and when I saw you two talking, I came over here. What were you talking about?"

"We were talking about the fine times we'll have at Cliffmore this Summer," Polly said, "and we can hardly wait to enjoy them."

"I'd not care to go there," Gwen said, with a toss of her head.

"Well, then," said Rose, "it's lucky you don't have to go there."

"Yes, isn't it?" Gwen said, cheerfully. "I could if I wanted to. Mamma will go wherever I wish, that is if I just act horrid enough."

"Why, what do you mean?" Polly asked, and Gwen laughed.

"You're funny girls," she said. "Don't either of you know that the way to get your own way is to scream and be just as horrid as you can until your mamma 'gives in?'"

"I'd not care to act like that," Princess Polly said, and Rose said: "Neither would I."

"Well, I want my own way, all the time and everywhere, and that's the way I get it," declared Gwen, and she danced off down the avenue, humming as cheerfully as if she had told of doing pleasant things.

"Isn't it queer'?" Rose said. "Gwen tells of being disagreeable, as if she felt proud of it."

"Mrs. Harcourt does the same thing," said Primrose Polly. "She's always telling of horrid pranks, and rude things that Gwen says, and she tells them as if she thought Gwen very smart to act so. It isn't odd that Gwen behaves so badly, for she likes to act just perfectly horrid. She says so, and if she thinks her mamma likes it, what is there to make her stop?"

"And Uncle John says, oh, I'd not tell exactly what he says, but he said only yesterday that he could not understand how any woman could let her little daughter grow up like a weed. He said Gwen was pretty to look at, but as unpleasant as a nettlebush. I'd not like anyone to say that of me," Rose said.

"Well, no one ever would say that about you," Polly said lovingly.

"Nor you," replied Rose.

Then, their arms clasping each other, they slipped down the sidewalk.

It was but a few days longer that they must wait before sailing to Cliffmore.

The year before, they had made the trip by train, but this time they were intending to go a short distance by rail, and then, on Captain Atherton's yacht, complete the trip by water. It would be a delightful sail, and as every member of the party loved the water, it was sure to be a merry little sailing trip down the bay.

Gwen Harcourt had not spoken truthfully when she had said that she would not wish to go to Cliffmore. Indeed, that very morning she had used her unpleasant method in an effort to coax her mother to go to Cliffmore, and for the first time in her little life, it had not worked.

She had heard from Polly, Rose, and Sprite of the pleasure that they had enjoyed there, and she had at once decided that no other place could be as delightful.

"I guess I can go there as well as they can," she had whispered to herself, and then, running up to the big living room she had first asked, then coaxed, and there, as a final effort, had screamed for a half hour. Mrs. Harcourt would, as usual, have quickly agreed at once to spend the Summer as Gwen wished, but it happened that other plans already made, rendered it impossible. The silly woman offered everything that she could think of to pacify Gwen, but Gwen declared that nothing would make up to her for the refusal to go to Cliffmore.

Then when she found her screaming wholly useless, she dried her eyes, and rushed out and down the avenue to tell Polly and Rose that she would not care to go there.

If she had waited a day longer to tell them it would have been as well, because Mrs. Harcourt, lest the disappointment might be too hard for Gwen, had, at great inconvenience, changed her plans, and on the following day she told Gwen that Cliffmore would be their summer home.

Gwen did not rush out this time to tell the news.

Had she not just said that she would not care to go there?

"I'll say nothing about it, and when they get to Cliffmore, they'll be s'prised to find me there, but I'll act as if I'd known all along that I'd be there," thought Gwen.

Mrs. Harcourt and Gwen went the next day, and thus it happened that when the "Dolphin" sailed up to the pier, the first person that Rose and Polly saw was Gwen, sitting high on the top of a tall post! It was a most successful surprise.

"Hello!" she cried, with impish laughter, "I got here 'fore you did!"

"Why so you did," Polly replied. "When did you come?"

"Oh, I've been here some time," she said, laughing again.

"Well, you've not been here a month, Gwen Harcourt!" said Rose. "It was only three days ago that you were in Avondale, and you said then that you'd not care to go to Cliffmore!"

"Well, I