"Well, what are we doing to-day?" asked Mr. Merrill as he finished his breakfast. "This is a fine enough day to be doing something big and important."

"I'm just going to play around," said Mary Jane, "I'd like to do something big if you have it, Daddah," she added, encouragingly. "Could we go on a picnic?"

"No more picnic for you this week, young lady!" answered Mr. Merrill. "I should think you were wet enough last Saturday to last a while!"

"But that wasn't the picnic's fault," explained Mary Jane, in distress, "that just happened, and I want to go on another picnic right away." To tell the truth, she had been a bit worried for fear her accident of the picnic would keep her father and mother from letting her go next time somebody gave a picnic party and she did so hope it wouldn't make any difference.

"I expect you do," laughed Mrs. Merrill, "and I'm certain your wetting didn't hurt you any. Don't you worry, dear, you shall go next time there is any picnic to go to. In fact, you and Alice and I may go on a picnic to-morrow—but it will be a picnic of quite a different kind, I'll assure you."

"Oh, mother! Do tell us what it will be!" exclaimed both girls.

"I was talking with Doris's mother last evening," began Mrs. Merrill, "and she tells me that it's very satisfactory to go to the city to buy hats and shoes. What would you think" (she asked Mr. Merrill) "if the girls and I took the trolley to the city to-morrow and bought our summer outfits?'

"I'd think that was a fine plan," said Mr. Merrill, "and I'd say that perhaps I'd go along if I was asked."

"Oh, would you, Daddah?" cried Alice. "That would be jolly. Then it's all settled—we're going!"

"Talk about deciding in a hurry," teased Mrs. Merrill; "when do we start?"

"I have some business that I've needed to do for a week. Suppose we all take the early limited that leaves at eight? Then we can have a good long day and time for a fine lunch together."

That plan suited Mrs. Merrill and was agreed upon at once. "Only remember," she reminded them, "eight o'clock on the car, means everybody up early."

"I'll set the alarm for six," promised Mr. Merrill.

"And I'll do my two days' practicing today," said Alice.

"And I'll help, mother, truly I will," said Mary Jane.

"We ought to have no trouble getting off then," said Mrs. Merrill, "and I, for one, think we'll have lots of fun."

That evening, every one laid out their clothes ready for morning; lists were made out and then the girls were sent to bed a whole hour earlier than usual so they would feel ready for the day's fun.

It was a good thing everything was planned before hand, for eight o'clock came very early the next morning—or so it seemed; and there was considerable scrambling to get hair ribbons on and gloves buttoned and the house all locked up in time for the car.

Alice had been to the city with her mother several times before; but this was Mary Jane's first trip and she watched out of the car window with great interest and was almost sorry when the car pulled into a big train shed—the interurban station.

"You lady folks shop till one," said father as they parted, "and then we'll meet for lunch."

Mary Jane thought she had never seen such big stores in all her life. Fortunately mother decided to do some of her own and Alice's shopping first and that gave Mary Jane a chance to look around and get used to things. But finally Mrs. Merrill said, "Now it's your turn, Mary Jane. Let's look at spring coats and then at play suits."

They got into the elevator again (and Mary Jane's heart took a funny "flip-flop" every time it started or stopped) and went to a floor where everything was for little girls. There seemed to be enough suits and dresses for all the little girls in the world and Mary Jane was certain sure that she could never tell which she liked best. But mother and Alice helped her and before very long they had bought a pretty little gray coat and one pink afternoon dress and two pink and two blue rompers for playtimes.

"There, now," said Mrs. Merrill as she looked at her watch, "that's all we can do before lunch. It's time to meet father this very minute." So they got into the elevator again and went to the top floor.

"This is the funniest store," Mary Jane told her father, who was waiting for them as they stepped off the car; "they sell dresses and coats and things to eat and everything right off of one elevator!"

"Think of that!" exclaimed her father as he piloted them to a table. "Well,
I believe I like the things to eat best—at least right now."

"What are you going to have?" he asked Mary Jane as they sat down and made themselves comfortable.

"May I have anything I want?" she asked, "anything?"

"Anything at all," her father assured her.

"Then I know what I want," said she promptly, "I want chicken broth and mashed potatoes and pink ice cream."

"That's what you're going to have," Mr. Merrill told the waiter. "I wish Alice could make up her mind as quickly," he added teasingly, for Alice was reading the whole menu from cover to cover before she made up her mind what to order.

Mary Jane had her chicken broth while the others were deciding and then she had a bit of mother's good fish to eat with the mashed potatoes which came later. And of course the pink ice cream, a big dish of it, all for herself.

"Now," said Mr. Merrill, when they were all through, "I'm going to buy Mary Jane a pair of white shoes and a pink parasol while you two finish what you have on your list and then maybe we'll have time to ride out to the park before we start for home."

"Oh!" cried Mary Jane, but that was all she could think of to say. Dresses and a coat and lunch and a ride and shoes and a parasol—all in one day! And it wasn't a birthday either, just a regular, every day sort of a day!

"Don't worry," laughed her father for he guessed what she was thinking, "this is just once a year! Come on, now, and we'll get the shoes."

They went back to the children's floor and bought the shoes and the prettiest pink parasol Mary Jane had ever seen and then, just as they were ready to go and meet mother and Alice, a friend of father's passed by.

"Well, Tom!" cried Mr. Merrill, and he jumped up to speak to him. Mary Jane couldn't hear all they said but from what she did hear, she guessed that the man lived a long way off and that he was buying clothes to take home to his little girl. "Sit right there, Mary Jane," Mr. Merrill called to her as he walked off in the direction of the elevator, "and I'll be back in five minutes."

Mary Jane looked around and up and down. She saw the wrapper girl high up in her box between the counters. She saw the busy clerks and floorman come and go. She saw the many shoppers—grown folks and children that passed by her seat. And the more folks she saw, the lonesomer she became; sitting there all by herself among so many folks.

"I don't think it's nice for a little girl to sit here in a big seat," she decided, "I think I'll sit somewhere that I won't show so much." And she looked around for a quiet corner. Between the big cases that formed the counters she spied just the place she wanted. A shelf down close enough to the floor for her to sit on and quite out of the way of the busy crowd.

"That's where I'll wait," she said softly, "then I won't show while I'm waiting for father." And she slipped back of the big cases while no one was looking and sat down on the shelf. But the minute she got away from the confusing noises and sights, she felt very sleepy, so sleepy that she could hardly keep awake; so very sleepy, so very—

Father's five minutes lengthened out to ten and then his friend stepped into the elevator and Mr. Merrill hurried back to his little girl.

"You must excuse me, dear," he said as he approached where he had left her, "but I hadn't seen Tom in ten years and—" But there was no little girl there!

Mr. Merrill called the floorman and asked about her. "I left her only ten minutes ago," he said as he looked at his watch, "and she wouldn't run off—I know Mary Jane wouldn't run off. She must be here."

"We'll find her," said the floorman, easily, "she must be in some other aisle."

They hunted up and down and up and down the aisles and they looked at many little girls—the store was full of them. But not a sign of Mary Jane did they see. Finally it came time to meet Mrs. Merrill and Alice so Mr. Merrill, knowing that they would be uneasy if he was late, hurried down to meet them and all three came back to resume the search that by now was getting pretty anxious.

"There's no need of your hunting on any other floor," said Mrs. Merrill as the floorman suggested that maybe Mary Jane had gone to hunt her father and had lost her way. "I know my little girl and she's not far from where her father left her. Show me where she was sitting when you left and I'll find her—I'm sure."

Mr. Merrill led her to the very seat where he had left Mary Jane and then, to the surprise of all the clerks and curious shoppers who had become interested in the search, Mrs. Merrill didn't rush around and hunt as the others had. Instead, she sat down in the seat as though she had all afternoon and not a worry in the world. And then, sitting down as Mary Jane had been, she began to look around. And the very first thing she saw was the shelf, way back out of the way; and on the shelf, huddled down in a sleepy heap, her own little girl!

How the people did stare as she jumped up quickly and hurried over to the between aisle where no one had thought of looking. And how every one did smile as she reached down and picked up Mary Jane—Mary Jane all sound asleep!

The little girl opened her eyes and slipped her arm around her mother's neck and then, as she noticed so many folks looking at her, she hid her sleepy eyes in her mother's shoulder.

"Don't you be afraid, little girl," said the floorman, in great relief, "we like little girls who know enough not to get lost. It was better to stay right there and go to sleep than to run around and hunt your father. You and your sister take this slip," and he wrote hastily on a scrap of paper, "and go upstairs to the lunch room. Maybe a dish of ice cream will help you to wake up."

So that was how it happened that Mary Jane had a trip and an adventure and some new clothes and two dishes of pink ice cream all in one day.