CHAPTER XV.
IN WHICH WINNIE CHAPERONS THE ENTIRE PARTY TO CONEY ISLAND At the last minute, Aunt Pattie Boyden fortunately contracted a toothache--and the Coney Island party was compelled to go unchaperoned.
They tried to be regretful and sympathetic as the six of them climbed into the big touring car, but Ashley Loring found them a solace.
"Never you mind," he soothed them--"Polly will chaperon us." "You've lost your address book," declared that young lady indignantly.
"Polly Parsons is not the person you have in mind.

I'll be old soon enough without that! The chaperon of this party is my adopted sister, Winnie." "Oh, fun!" accepted the nominee with delight.

"We had a course in that at school." And Winnie, in all the glory of her fluffy youthfulness, toyed carefully with the points of her Moorish collar.

"I was elected chaperon of the Midnight Fudge Club, and the girls all said that I fooled Old Meow oftener than anybody!" Thereafter there was no lull in the conversation; for Winnie, once started on school reminiscences, filled all gaps to overflowing; and Sammy Chirp, he of the feeble smile, whose diffidence had denied him the gift of language, gazed on her in rapt and happy stupefaction.
Meanwhile, Johnny Gamble found himself gazing as raptly at Constance until the chaperon, in a brief interlude between reminiscences, caught him at it.

She reached over and touched him on the back of the hand with the tip of one soft pink finger.