stockings, and particularly the feeling of "pull" of the sus-

penders. Neat shoes were slipped on my feet--the result, all girl- ish and quite delightful. I felt very conscious of my looks, but

Nell was highly pleased, lamenting only my short hair. How she did it I don't know, but she got hold of some long hair cuttings, moun- ted them on a hairnet, so that, pinned into place among my own hair (which we conspired to keep rather long), the appearance was of girl's hair down to my shoulders and falling round my ears and face, so that it needed to be tied back with a hair ribbon.

So, during the next year, I often dressed in Nell's room, sometimes with her as my helper, and sometimes by myself. I got thoroughly used to girl's clothes and to being a girl, but it al- ways gave me a thrill and a sense of satisfaction when I completed my transformation, and I never merely got used to my pretty things or in any way took them for granted. Nell always seemed to be so pleased to turn me into a girl--her sister. I hardly ever dared to go out of her room when changed over, even when we knew that the house was empty, for I had a fear that someone might appear suddenly and inevitably bring and end to my clandestine pleasures.

One evening I was dressed in an especially pretty frock--a party dress in green silk and white lace--with my corsets well laced in and my hair nicely done. Nell was out of the room, when the door opened and, thinking it was Nell, I said in an excited way, "Don't I look nice in this frock?* A voice said, "Yes, but what on earth are you doing in it?" Horror of horrors! It was my mother, returned much earlier than expected. I flushed with shame, when Nell came in and started to explain. There was much excited talk, but Mother couldn't, or wouldn't be convinced that it was a spec- ial, isolated occasion. She lifted up my skirt and involuntarily said, "What pretty legs you've got!" Then she exclaimed, "That's not a petticoat of Nell's, neither are those knickers!"

Presently we all calmed down. Nell confessed what we had been doing and how I'd often been dressed as a girl, how much sh● and I liked it and how we had kept it all a secret. She reminded Mother how much she had wanted me to be a girl when I was younger, and added that, as we all three liked it, why shouldn'tIcontinue dressing as a girl when it was possible and safe. At last Mother agreed and accepted me as Pat, another daughter, but said firmly that Father must never know.

26.