The more Patty saw of Hilda Henderson the better she liked her.

Hilda was not quite so scatter-brained as Clementine, yet she was far more merry and companionable than Lorraine.

So it came about that Hilda and Patty were much together.

They often walked together when the school went for a promenade in the Park, and Patty was surprised to find that there was a lot of fun in the English girl, after all.

Then, too, they were congenial in their tastes. They liked the same things, they read the same books, and they almost always agreed in their opinions.

One day the girls were gathered in the gymnasium. It was recreation hour, and the various groups of young people were chatting and laughing.

Patty sat in a window-seat, looking out at the steadily falling rain.

“It’s a funny thing,” she said, “but although a rainy day is supposed to be depressing, it doesn’t affect me that way at all. I feel positively hilarious, and I don’t care who knows it.”

“So do I,” said Hilda; “I’m as merry as a grig.”

“I know most of your English allusions,” said Patty, “but ‘grig’ is too many for me. What is a grig, and why is it merry?”

“A grig,” said Hilda, “why, it’s a kind of cricket or grasshopper, I think. I don’t know Natural History very well, but the habits of grigs must be merry, because ‘as merry as a grig’ is the only thing anybody ever heard about them.”

“Of course grasshoppers are merry,” said Clementine; “you can tell that by the way they jump. But grig is a much nicer name than grasshopper; it sounds more jumpy.”

“Girls!” said Patty, with an air of sudden importance, “I have a most brilliant idea!”

“Your first?” inquired Adelaide, interestedly.

“No, indeed,” said Patty, “I often have them when I’m in your vicinity. But this is really great. You know that foolishness about Prigs and Digs and Gigs?”

“Yes,” said the girls in chorus.

“Well, there’s no sense to it; it doesn’t mean anything, really.”

“Do you happen to know, Miss Fairfield, that you’re attacking old and time-honoured institutions of the Oliphant school?” asked Clementine in mock indignation.

“So much the worse for the honourable Time,” rejoined Patty. “Now listen; I think we can have a society, a real true society, I mean, that will be a lot more fun than any of those ancient and honourable orders.”

“Grigs!” cried Hilda, with a sudden flash of understanding.

“Yes,” said Patty, “Grigs. You see, I never could make up my mind which of those other three sets I’d belong to, because none of them seemed to fit me. Now if we start a society of Grigs, a regular club, you know, we can invite anybody we want in the school to join it.”

“What kind of a society will it be?” demanded Adelaide.

“What is the chief characteristic of a grig?” demanded Patty in return.

“Well, I never met one,” said Adelaide, “but Hilda says they have nothing but merriment to distinguish them from other animals.”

“That’s enough,” said Patty. “All that the members of our society need do is to be merry. Honest, girls, don’t you think it will be fun?”

“I do,” said Hilda, catching the spirit of the thing at once. “And we’ll have officers and dues, and regular meetings, just like——”

“Just like Parliament,” put in Clementine, “and then, my British subject, you’ll feel quite at home.”

“I used to belong to a club in Vernondale,” said Patty, “and we didn’t do anything but just drink tea and have fun at our meetings. We were merry as grigs, though we didn’t call ourselves by that name. But I think that’s a jolly name for a society—especially a society that has to be made up of Prigs and Gigs and Digs.”

“So do I,” said Hilda; “let’s organise right away.”

“Oh, we can’t,” said Patty, “we haven’t decided what girls to ask, or anything.”

“Let’s organise first,” said Adelaide, “just we four, you know, and then decide on the other members afterwards.”

“All right,” said Patty, “but the bell will ring in a minute and we won’t have time now. Besides, we can’t do it in such a hurry. Now I’ll tell you what; you girls come down to my house Saturday morning and then we’ll do it all up properly.”

“That’s a jolly lark,” said Hilda; “I’ll be there.”

And the others agreed to come, too.

So on Saturday morning the Fairfields’ library was the scene of a most animated club organisation.

“We ought to have some definite aim,” said Hilda, as they talked over ways and means.

“We have,” said Patty decidedly; “I’ve been thinking this thing over, and I really think that to be merry and to scatter merriment around the world is a worthy enough aim for anybody.”

“How do you mean to scatter it?” asked Adelaide, with a look of utter bewilderment at the idea.

“I don’t know yet, exactly,” said Patty; “that’s for the club to decide; but I’m sure there are lots of ways. You know the charitable societies scatter food and clothing, and there’s a Sunshine Society that scatters help or aid or something, and I do believe that there are plenty of ways to scatter merriment.”

“Do you mean to poor people?” asked Clementine.

“Not only to poor people,” said Patty; “it doesn’t make any difference whether they’re poor or not; everybody likes to have some fun, or if they don’t, they ought to.”

“It’s a great scheme,” exclaimed Hilda, her eyes shining, as she thought of various possibilities. “For one thing we could collect comic papers and take them to the hospitals.”

“Yes, that will be fine,” said Clementine, “for when most people send reading matter to the hospitals they send dry old books and poky old magazines that nobody can read. I know, because I have been to the hospital sometimes to read to the children, and I’ve seen the literature that was sent in. And of all forlorn stuff!”

“Yes, that’s the kind of thing I mean,” said Patty; “and we can go to the hospitals ourselves sometimes and chirk up the patients and make them laugh. Clementine could sing some of her funny songs. B............