CHAPTER XII.
"Averil's Atonement" "What are you dreaming of, Anne ?" The two girls were loitering one evening in a fairy hollow of the brook.
Ferns nodded in it, and little grasses were green, and wild pears hung finely-scented, white curtains around it.
Anne roused herself from her reverie with a happy sigh.
"I was thinking out my story, Diana." "Oh, have you really begun it ?" cried Diana, all alight with eager interest in a moment.
"Yes, I have only a few pages written, but I have it all pretty well thought out.

I've had such a time to get a suitable plot.

None of the plots that suggested themselves suited a girl named AVERIL." "Couldn't you have changed her name ?" "No, the thing was impossible.

I tried to, but I couldn't do it, any more than I could change yours.

AVERIL was so real to me that no matter what other name I tried to give her I just thought of her as AVERIL behind it all.