Betty Lee, Junior

There was room for the two girls on the cushions of the silken couch that was rather broader than the ordinary chaise longue. Golden hair and dark hair mingled, after Lucia arranged the cushions and settled down herself with her head in the curve of Betty’s shoulder and neck. She possessed herself of Betty’s hand and said, “I hope you don’t mind these close quarters.”

“I’m as comfy as can be,” returned Betty, giving a squeeze to the slender hand.

“You are such a comfortable person, Betty Lee, and I don’t feel that you are ready to take up everything a girl says or does to criticize it. I’ve been envying Carolyn and Kathryn for seeing so much of you.”

“Why, Lucia!” cried Betty, very much surprised. “I have time for more than one or two friends!”

“I know it and that is why I want to talk to you about things. By the way, Grandmother called you Mary, I noticed. There was a young friend of Aunt Laura’s, when she was a girl, by that name—Uncle said. If Grandmother could go to sleep by ‘Willie’ and never wake up, except in heaven, it would be a blessing. I’m glad I thought of taking the dolls to her, though it might have started a good deal of trouble, too. But she usually takes everything sweetly. That’s the advantage of having a good disposition, I suppose, if you lose your mind.”

“I’m afraid it might not make any difference; but its worth cultivating anyhow,” suggested sensible Betty.

“‘Like sweet bells jangled and out of tune’ Uncle says her mind is, but not ‘harsh,’ as Ophelia says of Hamlet. I thought of it when we were reading Hamlet in English the other day. But that isn’t what I want to talk to you about. It is what I am going to do about staying in America—and that brings in other things. I hardly know how to begin.”

Betty said nothing, but laid her cheek over against Lucia’s soft hair.

“If you only understood Italian, Betty! Che peccato! That means ‘What a pity’—for I’ll forget myself and want to drop into my natural tongue when I’m telling about home and my father and mother. If I forget and say anything that you do not understand, just remind me, please.”

“I wish I did know Italian. Maybe I could learn to speak it some time.”

“It’s easy, especially when you know Latin and French.”

This was the introduction to Lucia’s story. She did drop into Italian at times, but caught herself. Betty missed nothing important.

“You can imagine, Betty, how I dreaded coming to America to stay when I tell you that it was at the end of a terrible quarrel between my father and mother. I do not mean a loud, awful time, but one of those still, quiet stiletto exchanges of opinions and decisions. My father accused my mother of not caring for him. Mother set her teeth and said that the matter was of no consequence one way or another because it was quite clear that he had never cared for her. And, Betty, both of them love each other dearly, though I suppose it has gone too far for anything but one of those dreadful divorces. This last talk was before me, and I tried to say something; but both of them told me to keep quiet. It had to be talked through.

“The point was this. My uncle had begged her to come for a while, writing her about Aunt Laura’s death and Grandmother’s condition and business worries, and some of her money is in the business, you know. Then she wanted to have me in American schools for a while. Also she was homesick. School was an excuse.

“That would have been an interesting thing for me if it had not been for the trouble between my father and my mother. He was tired of trips to America, he said. Oh, one thing led to another and they were so far apart it makes me sick to think about it all. Finally I think my father told her that if she went to America to stay any length of time, that is, to stay with me while I was having what she wanted in school for me, she need not come back, so far as he was concerned. And she said she never would. Betty, my mother packed up and so did my father; and after the next day—I’ve never seen my father since.”

Lucia choked a little, stopped and used the little handkerchief again.

“Before he married my mother he was interested in travel and hunting and all that. So he started right away, for an eastern trip first, over into India and other countries, and now he is on an African safari; he wrote me just before he left Cairo for some other point. I’ve heard from him as often as it was possible for him to write. He does not intend to let me go, you know. He said she might have her way for a while with the schools, but that he would come for me. He never asks how my mother is, or mentions her at all. But when I write, I tell him; for I know he wants to know. I tell him about how well she is and a little bit about what she is doing. In the last letter I said, ‘to keep from being too unhappy and missing you.’

“I casually mention hearing from my father to my mother and I leave the letter where she can read it, pretending to take it for granted that she will read it, of course. But Mother wouldn’t ask for the letters and for a long time I think she didn’t read them, till one day I wanted to look up something my father said about what he was doing and I found several old letters to me lying on Mother’s desk. Of course she had been called somewhere and had forgotten to take them back to my room. It did not matter, to be sure, except to keep from me that she wanted to read them. Do you think I am very dreadful to tell anybody all this, Betty? You see I want you to tell me what else you think I could do.”

But Lucia did not wait for Betty’s comment. She went on with the account.

“I’m not going to put up with it, Betty! I’m going back to my father this summer if he wants me! I’m putting by enough money for my fare and passage across, though I think I could cash a draft from him without their finding it out. Perhaps that would bring Mother! I don’t know! I’ve thought and thought about it until I’m most sick over it now.” Lucia checked a sob.

“You saw that horrid man at the table tonight and heard the silly compliments he makes to my mother. She doesn’t care a centime for him; but she’s getting so reckless with all this social stuff that I’m most scared for fear she will start divorce proceedings.”

“Couldn’t you talk to your uncle about it?” asked Betty, who thought it a terrible situation indeed. “It doesn’t seem to me that it would do for you to just go off, even if your father does want you.”

“I will if my mother is going to leave him. I almost ran away to keep from coming.” Lucia’s voice was defiant.

“Well, then, why don’t you write to your father, tell him that you know your mother loves him and tell him just to come over and get her!”

Lucia laughed then. “The girls would say that you are old-fashioned, Betty. Men don’t carry their wives off nowadays.”

Betty laughed but asserted that they “ought to sometimes.” “It’s their business to take care of their wives and if their wives are—mistaken—to prove it to them. My father would say, ‘Now, dear, this is all a mistake. You come right along home with me and I’ll explain it to you!’”

“What if she wouldn’t go?”

“Then he’d tell her that they must think of the children first and that two people who wanted to do the right thing ought to get along somehow, even if they didn’t love each other. I’ve heard them both say that, about other people.”

“You asked me if I couldn’t talk to my uncle. I would only that Mother did when we first came and told him all the cutting things my father had said. Uncle just raved and was for a legal separation right away, but my mother saw she had gone too far and told him that they would wait. My uncle called him a fortune hunter; and he thought that about him anyway, before they were married. They talked about it that time in Milan.”

Betty could imagine what sharp things must have been said. She was quiet, thinking over what Lucia had told her and Lucia stopped to wipe her eyes again.

“Well,” she said with a sigh, “it’s helped clear things up, some way, to talk with you, Betty. I believe I will write and tell my father to come and ‘get her!’ I could ask him if neither of them cared enough about me to try to make up, and if he wanted to see some other man fall in love with my mother and try to win her, all for the want of his making love the way he can. Oh, you ought to see my father, Betty. Giovanna says that they fell in love at first sight because of their looks. And my father is not a fortune hunter! He hasn’t as much money as my mother has and I suppose that is one reason why he was so proud about the whole thing; but he has a good home in Milan. You’d love it, Betty, and I hope you’ll be in it some day. Oh!”

Now, indeed, Lucia cried in earnest and Betty, holding her affectionately, let her cry it out.

The door stood a little ajar and Lucia, having difficulty in stifling her sobs, suddenly rose and ran toward it, to close it, as Betty guessed. Lucia had merely pushed it to before they had cuddled down in the cushions. But as she grasped the ornate bronze handle, the first notes of something beautiful sounded upon the piano below. Lucia stopped, caught her breath as one does after crying, mopped her eyes again and stood still to listen. After a sparkling prelude, a voice began to sing.

Betty sat up at once. “Oh, that lovely voice, Lucia. Who is it?” Betty had in mind the ladies who were around that dinner table. This was a clear soprano voice, haunting and full of feeling as the song went on.

Lucia turned and softly said, “My Mother.” She waited a few moments and then ran into her bathroom to bathe her tear-stained face. But Betty went over to the door to listen till the song was over. It was nothing that she knew—some Italian song, but Betty felt an ache at her heart. Who was this that could sing like that? Betty had seen the countess in several different moods or phases—that of the capable traveler, the efficient mother when Lucia came home after her slight injury upon the hike, the pleasant, well-poised, gracious hostess—now here was something else.

The song was finished. When Betty heard the voices in conversation again, she closed the door and went back to where her books were, looking over her lesson till Lucia came back. Lucia was smiling and said that it was “all over.”

“I’m not going to be silly and cry again, Betty, but I shall probably want to talk to you about this some more. Here are some of my father’s letters. I keep them in my desk, you see. See how fat they are? He tells me about the hunts and the going through that queer country and everything that he thinks would interest me and help me to learn about it. Sometimes he puts in little things that I know he thinks my mother may read.”

Betty took in her hands a letter that Lucia handed her. It was, of course, written in Italian and very “fat,” as Lucia said. “I don’t think that you were silly to cry, Lucia. I don’t see how you can help feeling as you do. Your father must be a very interesting man and your mother is certainly a gifted woman.”

“Mother was studying music in Milan when she met my father, you know.”

Some slight progress had been made in lessons, but the girls retired earlier than Betty had supposed they would, for when the maid came in after rapping, upon some little errand of Lucia’s clothing, Lucia told her that she was tired and would go to bed very soon. Betty was only too glad to do the same thing and the girls soon said goodnight. In a comfortable bed, under white blankets and a silken comforter, as Betty noticed, she soon fell to sleep. It was nice to have a maid fussing around to do things for you, to open your window just the right amount, arranging a little screen of some sort, to see that your clothing was placed properly. But maids weren’t mothers!

Breakfast the girls had alone, as they rose earlier than either the countess or Mr. Murchison. Lucia told Betty that it was unusually early for her on a Saturday morning, but if they did “Christmas shopping,” they were wise to have a good start, as the stores would be full of people. Moreover, the countess herself would want the chauffeur to drive her down later in the day.

“Mother will sleep till noon, I suppose,” said Lucia, “because I think everybody stayed late last night. Uncle will drive his coupe down town, and we can have Horace and the big car all morning.”

The plans for shopping were made. Betty informed Lucia that for a president of Lyon “Y” she knew little about the usual plans for Christmas, but that the committee had asked her to buy certain things. Both girls had also personal shopping to do and it was like shopping with a fairy godmother to go with Lucia. She insisted on paying from her own purse for the materials Betty had been asked to buy. She bought half a dozen more dolls because she thought them “cute.” These were dressed. Betty still felt dubious about what the committee would think, but after all wouldn’t some “kiddie” love them!

It was a rather delirious morning for Betty. If she had not had a list, she would have been too excited to think properly, she said. When she told Lucia that the Lyon “Y” had adopted a family and related the story of the Thanksgiving baskets, Lucia began to buy toys “regardless,” Betty told her.

“Oh, let’s make them think old Santa just had a spill of toys from his old sleigh!” said Lucia, as happy as Betty, looking into the gayly decked windows, or descending into the store basements where the toys were displayed.

Betty had “always” intended to go back to see what was the result with the “Sevillas,” but there was so much to do at school with lessons and tests and other duties and at home in preparation for the holidays that she had not “had a minute” to spare, it seemed. Her father was unusually busy, too; and when she spoke to him about the coincidence of the names and referred to the odd parenthesis in Ramon Balinsky’s letter, he had only said that it “might be well to look into it.”

The crimson car was pretty well filled with packages when Lucia had finished her shopping, for why should they wait to have things delivered when they wanted to see them right away? And Lucia sent the car home, telling Betty that her mother might want it and that there was no use in keeping Horace waiting around while they had lunch down town.

Betty assured Lucia that any arrangement was satisfactory to her, as they entered a pretty tea room and lingered over their lunch, ordered by Lucia after consultation with Betty. Chicken salad and toothsome desserts figured largely in the order and Betty was sure that she would want nothing that afternoon; yet Lucia was serving such a “complete” afternoon tea! But a few hours make a great difference in young appetites.

Clothes bothered Betty a little. She hoped that her frock was proper for an “afternoon dress;” but she felt sure that many of the girls would not dress elaborately, in spite of their coming to a house presided over by a countess. Some of the girls could not, she knew.

When Miss Street and Miss Hogarth arrived in pretty but quiet frocks, Betty felt that everybody would be “all right” for clothes. Lucia herself must have had ideas on the subject; for she wore a dress that she had worn to school. Mathilde and a few of the late joiners, who had been largely influenced by Lucia’s membership, were more or less elaborately dressed; but clothes ceased to have much part in Betty’s thoughts, as she consulted with Miss Street and Miss Hogarth and the committee about the meeting. The countess came in to welcome the girls and their leaders most cordially. She well knew that the girls would have felt defrauded if they had not had a glimpse of her, as Betty gleaned from some little remark she made to Lucia. Two sewing machines were in the rear drawing room and Giovanna and Lina, in pretty caps and aprons were ready for work.

This arrangement was a surprise to Miss Street and Miss Hogarth, who thanked the countess warmly and remarked that they might have planned to have something beside clothes for dolls sewed that afternoon if they had realized what an opportunity it was. To this Countess Coletti replied that she would be glad to furnish machines and maids and house room some other time if the girls were sewing for the poor. She left the room with pleasant regrets and presently Betty heard the car starting to take her to some engagement or a shopping tour.

It was a petty scene, with the girls, their bright expressions and young figures, their thimbles and sewing bags or boxes, the little heaps of bright materials or filmy white or laces, wide or narrow, and dolls of all sorts, either in the girls’ laps or upon the tables. On the walls above them were several fine reproductions of famous paintings and an etching or two. Objects of art had largely been removed from this room to make place for chairs and folding tables and the machines. It seemed a pity to drop any threads or scraps upon that “gorgeous” oriental rug.

Betty clapped her hands for order. “While you get ready to begin sewing girls, Miss Street and Miss Hogarth will tell you what the plans are. The committee, too, may have some information to give you, and I’ll call on the chairman now to speak of them. I am too new as president to know much about what the ‘Y. W.’ does at Christmas time, except a few of the results. I will ask Lilian Norris to explain.”

Some of the girls were threading needles and beginning to sew on edges, or to fit little garments to their dolls, according to the state of progress to which the process had arrived.

“I’ve been talking to Miss Street and Miss Hogarth, girls, and this is what we are to do. You know we decided to adopt a family; and as the Woods family is such a nice one and needs everything so badly, our leader thinks we might as well take them. Please put it to vote, Betty, and then I’ll tell the rest.”

Betty, widely smiling at Lilian’s business-like methods, put the question, with a unanimous “Aye” as the result.

“That is good,” said Lilian. “We filled two baskets as it happened, at Thanksgiving, and we were told that both of them ‘went to the spot.’ Miss Hogarth called afterwards, but the Sevillas, who were the other people, very proud and not asking for any help, had moved; and the Woods lady did not know where they had gone.”

At this Betty had a pang. Suppose they were connected with Ramon—and she had neither gone to ask them nor written to him! That was the way a body perhaps missed a big opportunity.

But Lilian was still speaking. “I think, girls, that we should be very careful, too, about what we say about our family. They are like us in wanting to be independent and because they haven’t the good luck we have, there is no need of rubbing it in by telling everybody about them or what we do. Let’s have a little sympathy and delicacy!

“And now I’ll tell about the dolls. As you know, we bought some just alike and passed them around to be dressed, each girl paying, however, for her own doll. But then we had the membership drive and a lot of new members and we decided, that is, the committee did, that everybody could select her own doll. And these are not to be sent out with baskets, girls. They are to be for the Toy Shop that we are going to have at the ‘Y,’ and sold. There is to be a prize given for the best-dressed and the prettiest doll in the show—I forgot to say that we’re going to have big Christmas doings at the ‘Y’ down town—and I do hope that our group gets the prize for the prettiest doll and the foxiest booth! The prize is just some decoration or something in the way of an honor, you know. I think that is all, Madam President.”

Betty, who was very glad of this explanation, which corrected her own ideas about the dolls, called on the two leaders to ask if they had anything to tell the girls. Both of them confirmed Lilian’s statements and urged the girls to make this the most beautiful Christmas they had ever had, for themselves and for others, with their thoughts on higher motives than merely what material things they could get for themselves. Miss Hogarth asked for the names of those who were willing to take part in the carols and those who could furnish machines. Lucia’s hand went up to both questions and Betty felt a little warmth about her heart to see how sweet Lucia’s face had grown as she listened to Miss Hogarth’s brief references to the higher ideals. Perhaps trouble was not so bad for Lucia after all. And it all must turn out right for her!

The rest of the afternoon was a jumble of visiting and sewing. The presence of the maids and the machines called for more efficiency than probably would have been shown in an ordinary meeting. Fingers flew. The committee and Miss Street measured and cut out little garments from the “dearest” little doll patterns, bought that morning by Lucia and Betty, who risked sizes and thought that Giovanna, at least, could reduce or enlarge when necessary. The machines hummed away and the two maids seemed to have as much fun as anybody, particularly as Lucia treated them “just like family,” according to Mathilde, who was properly shocked. Mathilde, while “sweet as sugar” to Lucia, according to Dotty Bradshaw, could say some very funny things about her. “I wouldn’t care for such a friend,” said Dotty.

Betty had dropped down by Dotty, who wanted to know whether she thought a certain scrap of pretty lace would make a good finish for the neck of the doll dress she was making, or whether a little embroidered collar would be more suitable to the pattern. Betty gave her opinion on this weighty question and then Dotty informed her that Mathilde was “going to ask her if Lucia’s father and mother were going to get a divorce.”

“I thought I’d better warn you, Betty,” said Dotty, “I thought Mathilde chose a funny place to talk about it—Lucia’s own house.”

Betty smiled. Could Dotty be curious, too? “Thanks, Dotty. Yes, it isn’t usually done, talking about your hostess—or talking about people who have just been entertaining you. If I knew, I should scarcely give any information to Mathilde or anybody else. I’m having such a lovely visit and I’m sure the more we know Lucia the better we’ll like her. And isn’t it great of Countess Coletti to take such an interest in ‘good works?’ Oh, yes, Selma, I’ll bring you that pattern in just a minute. I think Peggy Pollard is using it now.”

Betty did not try to do any sewing herself. She would finish her doll at home. But Lucia, whose doll had not been brought downstairs, came to ask her if she should display it.

“I’m afraid the girls will think I’m trying to show off if I do, but several of them have asked me where my doll is and I had to tell them I had one. I shouldn’t have gotten such an—elaborate one, I suppose; but I did not think and I always choose what I think is the prettiest. What do you think, Betty?”

“I think that you must decide for yourself, Lucia. It does seem a perfect shame that they should not see that pretty thing!”

Lucia looked thoughtful and disappeared from the room for a short time. But Betty noted on her return that she was not carrying the doll; and at her first opportunity Lucia explained. “I did think that perhaps I would bring it down. Giovanna is going to dress it for me—or was. But just as I had it out of its box Bessie came running down from upstairs and said that Grandmother Ferris had asked about it. She had ‘Willie’ but where did ‘Josie’ go? Josie was another of her children that died. Isn’t it pitiful? So I just sent Bessie back with the other doll and I hope that they are having a quiet time putting baby clothes on it. I’ll send Lina up as soon as we serve. I think it would be nice to have some of the girls serve and do it myself, don’t you?”

“Yes, I do, Lucia,” emphatically answered Betty. “How is the grandmother today?”

“Just as quiet and happy as can be most of the time, Bessie says, only awfully bewildered. Help me choose the girls, Betty.”

Betty shook her head in the negative, and with a smile advised Lucia to choose the girls that would care most about it.

Lucia gave Betty a bright glance and laughed. Mathilde and two of her friends were among the first asked, Betty saw. She was not needed herself and helped to gather up the precious materials and scraps, distributing them to one and another of the girls. Thimbles were put away and sewing bags laid upon the tables while the conversation did not wane. The girls selected by Lucia to help her were chiefly for ornament; for Mathilde sat at the decorated table in the dining room, to pour chocolate from a silver urn, and the other girls passed the first plates and then sat down, with the rest about the room, to enjoy their own. The careful butler and several maids appeared to do the rest of it, though Lucia and the other girls passed cakes from pretty containers on the table, for a second time. It was all most delightful and from Lucia’s standpoint very informal.

The countess came home early and was again gracious enough to appear and speed the parting guests, standing by Lucia as the girls thanked her for their good time as well as for her help to the group. “We are certainly delighted, Lucia,” said Lilian Norris, “that you have come into Lyon ‘Y’ and hope you’ll not regret it. We’ll not ask too much of you. This has been wonderful.”

“It does not hurt any of us, my dear,” said Countess Coletti, “to try to help a little.”

It seemed a very natural thing that Betty should accompany Countess Coletti and Lucia to church. Mr. Murchison came in later, Horace having returned for him, Betty supposed. Like a little mouse Betty sat quietly between the countess and Lucia to listen to the service. Mathilde Finn, whose church membership was unknown to Betty, sat a few seats in the rear and Betty hoped that Mathilde was not too jealous or that she herself would not appear too complacent over her entertainment. With some of the girls as they were, about notice from the “nobility,” it was impossible not to feel self-conscious at times. But Betty had none of that toadying quality in her and was rather inclined to the other extreme, of letting the “society” people go more than their half way if they wanted her company. She knew the sort of people her father and mother admired and numbered among their friends, people who were in character and ideals, and it must be confessed that Betty liked “folks that were smart!” By that Betty meant those who had certain qualities of mind, irrespective of clothes, or money, or, indeed, opportunity; for leaders do not always come out of the schools and colleges.

At first Betty could not sing the hymns for listening to the countess. But she soon piped away, sweetly, too, in a sort of duet with Lucia, whose voice was contralto. “I’ll sing with you when we go carolling,” whispered Lucia, with a bright glance, as she took the hymn-book which they had been sharing.

Betty was ashamed to think afterwards how little of the sermon she heard, after the first of it. The preacher was a little prosy compared to her own pastor; and Betty’s thoughts would wander to what Lucia had told her, to Count and Countess Coletti, and with a remorseful feeling to the “Sevillas,” who had moved without her knowledge. One moment she felt that it made no difference and that they probably were not in the least connected with Ramon; the next minute she was sure that they were related and had something to do with the mystery that surrounded the “Don.”

She thought of various things that Lucia could do, to bring her father—and knew that she could do none of them. But finally the response and the words of the Scripture, quoted or read by the minister, or held in the messages of the Christmas hymns that had been chosen, had their effect on Betty. It would all come right. Why not take it all to the heavenly Father in prayer, as the preacher suggested, and leave it there, so far as worry was concerned?

That afternoon Betty went up with Lucia to see Grandmother Ferris again, at Countess Coletti’s suggestion. “She asked for ‘Mary’ this morning,” said the countess. The girls found Mrs. Ferris in bed, the two dolls in a light single bed not far away.

She looked very white and weak, but held out a welcoming hand. Then she put her finger to her lips to caution them. “Speak gently,” said she. “‘Willie’ and ‘Josie’ have just gone to sleep.” She called Betty “Mary” again and spoke of her hair. “Mary, you always had such pretty hair!”

The girls remained only a short time and Lucia had tears in her eyes as they went out into the hall. “It’s a good thing that I happened to join the Lyon ‘Y,’” said Lucia, “and bought those dolls.”

“I wonder if things just ‘happen,’” suggested Betty.

The crimson car deposited Betty, with her baggage, at the Lee home, late in the afternoon. Doris, in a fine humor, was just helping her mother set out their light Sunday evening supper. Betty had wondered how Doris would be and had determined not to do any “raving” about her good time, for fear Doris might think she was “crowing” or “gloating” over it; for Doris was a little difficult at times; and it was not unnatural that she should wish to share her elder sister’s happy times. But Doris herself asked to hear “all about the life of the nobility.”

“I suppose you had a gorgeous time, Betty,” said she.

“Oh, yes, and so many girls came Saturday afternoon and we’re having the prettiest dolls fixed for the Toy Show. I can scarcely tell you fast enough. When we sit down at the table, I can tell all the details you’d like to know.”

But Doris was full of her own plans and told Betty how her mother was letting her “stay all night” with Stacia Barnett, a recent friend, whom Doris was admiring at present with all her freshman heart. There was to be a freshman party that afternoon, a Christmas party, near the Barnett home; so Doris was to go home with Stacia and stay that Friday night and perhaps over Sunday, the Sunday before Christmas. “I am going carolling, too,” said Doris.

“That is fine,” said Betty, though she did not admire Stacia particularly and wondered at the choice of Doris in being as intimate as the two girls were at present. Doris rattled on, to Betty’s relief, and Betty’s experience was put into the background, which was just as well.

Later Mrs. Lee came to Betty to ask her what she thought about her permitting Doris to go with Stacia for such a visit. “Doris tells me that Stacia is such a fine girl; and you were not here to tell me anything about her.” Mrs. Lee looked thoughtful. “You know I do not approve of week-end visits as a rule, except with older girls. But Doris was so insistent and reminded me that you were having ‘everything you wanted’—so for the sake of peace I yielded. I always want you children to do what you want to do, if it is good for you.”

“I know you do, and you’re the dearest mother in the world!” warmly said Betty, giving her mother a hug. They were sitting on the edge of Betty’s bed for a mother and daughter chat.

“I don’t believe there is any harm in letting Doris go, Mother. So far as I know, Stacia is all right. She puts a good deal of color on her face sometimes; but some nice girls do, and the freshmen have to try everything, you know. We can trust Doris to have a little sense, I suppose.”

“I’m not so sure,” smiled Mrs. Lee. “Doris is getting a little heady of late. Keep an eye on her at school, Betty. Doris is a lovely child and I want her to have helpful companions, not the kind that she has to help.”

Betty laughed at that and went on to tell her mother about Grandmother Ferris and the dolls and how good Mr. Murchison was to her. “That is something that I thought Father would like to know about the head of the firm,” finished Betty.

Perhaps it was because Betty had in mind her mother’s injunction that she happened to see Doris and Stacia in one of the halls at school as she passed from one class to another.

Doris, seeing Betty, hastened to turn her face in another direction and stepped behind Stacia. But Betty had already seen that the bright and attractive face of her younger sister was just a little too bright, with a stain of color high on her cheeks and a red on her lips that could only be from lipstick.

“Silly little piece!” thought Betty. “She’s trying to ape Stacia!” And at home that afternoon, she remarked to Doris, “Someone couldn’t see me in the hall this morning.” She gave Doris a meaning look as she said this, but her lips were pursed in an amused smile.

Doris flushed. The applied color had been washed from her face before her appearance at home. “I saw you taking me in,” she pertly said. “Don’t you tell mother, Betty. There isn’t anything wicked about ‘make-up.’”

“Is that what Stacia calls it?” asked Betty. “No, I don’t suppose there is anything wrong; Mother never said no. It’s Father and Dick that say they’ll ‘wash our faces’ if they ever see us with any on. All the same, Mother doesn’t like it.”

“If you didn’t have any more natural color than Stacia has, you’d use it too, Betty Lee!” cried Doris, still on the defensive, though Betty had made no threat whatever.

“I wonder,” said Betty. “Honestly, Doris, I always feel that I want people to like the real me, not any painted up face. But I’ll not speak of it to Mother. I know you want to have your week-end and so far as I know Stacia is a good enough girl.”

This speech seemed to annoy Doris still further.

“Oh, you think you’re so smart because you’re a junior! Mother has promised and I’d have my week-end anyhow. I’d just a little rather you wouldn’t tell Mother. I don’t know that I like lipstick myself. But it’s my own affair!”

“Yes,” said Betty, “and those things are between you and Mother, Doris. Still, you shouldn’t let Mother be in the dark about your friends. Have a good time and tell her all about it—is my advice.”

“I’m not asking for advice, thank you.”

This rebellion and withdrawing from confidence on the part of Doris was a surprise to Betty, who realized now that she might have seen it coming. Perhaps she had been too much absorbed in her own affairs, and with her own friends. She must see more of her at school, possibly. Since helping her start her freshman year, she had gone on “her own way rejoicing,” Betty acknowledged to herself. She had Carolyn and Kathryn and she wondered if she had shut Doris out too much. That must be changed, provided she could change it now. She wasn’t going to play the part of mentor. It was for her mother to rebuke, or manage, and it would be a delicate proposition to carry out her mother’s injunction to “keep an eye” on Doris.

Betty was a little puled, but the push and stir of her own life with the hard lessons and all the “extras,” as she told the family, she hardly had time to breathe! She came through some examinations on Friday, prepared Monday’s lessons on Saturday, went to Sunday school and church on Sunday and helped get the family dinner. Then she declared that she was a wreck and curled up on her bed, under a warm extra blanket, for a nap.

She had scarcely more than dozed off, she thought, though she found afterwards that she had been sleeping for two hours, when she heard a gay voice and some one coming down the hall; and here was Doris, coming in to put Betty’s over-night bag, borrowed for the occasion, down on the floor with a bump, and a voice none too gracious exclaim, “You here, Betty? I thought I was going to get a rest by myself!”

“You shall,” answered Betty, springing up, thoroughly awake now and looking at her watch. “I thought you weren’t coming home till tonight.”

“I wasn’t,” said Doris, banging the door shut. Betty winced and wondered if Mrs. Lee would not reprove Doris for that. But wise Mrs. Lee had seen the storm behind the gay manner and jolly greeting with which Doris had favored her and her father on her entrance. There was a sudden change now.

“I couldn’t stand it any longer, Betty,” said Doris. “I told Mother just now that I had a little headache from too much candy and that is the truth, but not all of it. I haven’t slept a wink, I do believe, and I’m about dead!”

Betty was off the bed by this time, helping Doris take off her coat and taking her hat from her hand. “You poor little thing! Let me get you into bed! How about some peppermint and soda or some milk of magnesia for the indigestion?” Betty half laughed as she asked this, and Doris laughed too, but quaveringly, and all at once she put her head on Betty’s shoulder and sobbed. “Mrs. Barnett gave me an aspirin for my head. I hated to take it for I never took one before and it made me feel awfully funny for a while. But I had to make some excuse for coming home and my head did ache, though not so terribly. They were just as kind as could be, or meant to be and I’ll never tell anybody but you all about it.”

Doris said all this in jerks as she sat on the bed, half crying into her handkerchief and letting Betty draw off her shoes and stockings. Only a week before Betty had had another experience with tears, at Lucia’s. It made her feel happier than she had been then, to know that her prickly little sister was returning to the state of confidences.

“I can’t imagine, Doris, but the thing for you to do is to get to sleep. I’m going to fix something warm for you to drink first.”

“No, don’t. Get me the peppermint and that will fix me, and don’t let Mother know that I’m so dead!”

Usually Mother would have been the first to console, but Doris was sensitive. When Betty appeared in the living room, Mrs. Lee asked how Doris was feeling. “There is something the matter, but I thought that you might handle it.”

“Doris thinks that she hasn’t slept a wink, Mother. She probably has, for I thought I hadn’t slept and found that I had been asleep two hours. Doris says that they were very kind but she seems all tired out and I just helped her off with her clothes so that she could really go to bed. Don’t you worry. If she wakes up and wants something to eat in the night, I’ll get it for her!”

Mrs. Lee gave Betty an amused look and said, “Good child. I think you may have to give Doris a little more of your time, Betty.”

“I’ve just been wondering about that myself, Mother. I’m sorry.”

Little by little Doris told Betty about her visit. There had been a very pleasant party on Friday to which Doris had gone directly from home. Then came the evening with Stacia’s family, all kind and pleasant, Doris said, but “different.” Stacia’s mother and big sisters smoked cigarettes and Stacia “smoked some” before they went to bed and “didn’t put up the window; said it was too cold.”

“If you think Stacia paints, you ought to see her sisters, and her mother, too. They are all what Stacia calls modern, you know. I liked it at first and they are good folks, Betty—at least Stacia’s mother and father are. I don’t know about her sisters, or her brother.

“Well, the radio went all evening and we had to yell to talk above it. I was too polite at first to talk at all, but I had to. It kept on going for the late programs and with that and the smoke in the whole house and no window up, I couldn’t sleep a mite.

“I felt better in the morning and we went down town to do Christmas shopping. Stacia showed me a lovely shop and I got something nice for Mother. You mustn’t look in your bag, yet, though, for there’s something there for you, too. We had a grand lunch, and then, in the afternoon, Stacia had a little party for me. That is why I can never say a word about all this. They were so good to me! I’m going to give Stacia something nice for Christmas—wouldn’t you?”

“Yes, I would,” gently said Betty.

“That night at supper, dinner, I mean, they had wine, I’m sure. They did not say what it was, but it was in a wine glass and I tasted it and it was terribly bitter. I don’t see how anybody likes the stuff. Jim—that’s Stacia’s brother and such a handsome, dear sort of boy, about eighteen, I imagine—Jim drank a lot of it, till his father said real low, ‘That’s enough, Jim.’

“Then they took me to a moving picture, not down town, but in the suburb, you know. And we stayed up awfully late with the radio again and this time some more wine, only I didn’t take any, only cake. Stacia urged me to try one of her sister’s cigarettes. I believe they don’t want Stacia to smoke yet, so she didn’t do it until we went upstairs. It made me cough just to smell all the smoke, so I said ‘no, thank you, Stacia,’ and got undressed. And then—” Doris lowered her voice—“about two o’clock, I think, somebody came stumbling up the stairs, and somebody was talking to him, and helping him, I think. Stacia woke up and sat up in bed. We could see a little, for there was a light in the hall. She saw I was awake and I sat up, too.

“Then she said, ‘Oh, that’s just Jim, coming home drunk as usual.’ And she lay down again and went right to sleep! My—I’d never go right to sleep if it were Dick! And I’ve already asked Stacia to come here some time for a week-end! What shall I do about it?”

“Have her. Mother will like to do it for you. You needn’t tell her a thing, but Mother will see some things for herself, you know. We’ll give Stacia our kind of a good time and your debt will be paid. And you can keep on being nice to her at school, I should think, Doris. It’s easy enough to have other friends and stop being intimate without dropping anybody with a jolt. That wouldn’t be kind.”

“My, Betty, I’m glad you are my sister! I was afraid you’d want me not to have anything more to do with Stacia, and Stacia likes me.”

“Perhaps you can be a good influence, Doris; but it isn’t very good for you to make such a close friend of Stacia. I’m sure you will ‘use good judgment about it,’ as Mother always says.”

“My, I’m glad I belong to this family. But Stacia will think us ‘slow.’ That’s her word.”

“We’ll have a party for her and do so many nice things that she will think being ‘slow’ is the finest thing in the world! Now let’s talk about Christmas presents.”

It was characteristic of Betty’s rushing life, a life she loved, by the way, that she should be whisked from Lucia’s woes and the glimpse of life at the Murchison home to the problems of Doris, in her own well ordered home, and then to the pushing program of school, with the last Christmas preparations. Plenty of sleep at night, on which Betty’s parents insisted as a rule, gave Betty energy for every day’s full program.

There is no time so full of joyous anticipations, merriment and human kindness as that just before Christmas. Temporarily Betty was in charge of a Sunday school class of children, little girls whose teacher was ill. These she was teaching Luke’s beautiful Christmas story and to sing out sweetly “It came upon the midnight clear, That glorious song of old,” for they were to sing that in their Christmas celebration. Betty herself was to be an angel in the Christmas pageant at the church and had finally a minor part in the Christmas play at the high school.

“Oh, yes, Carolyn,” said she one morning at school, “having nothing to do, I thought I’d take on a few more things to practice for! But how can you refuse when it’s all so lovely?”

There were pleasing mysteries at home, packages whisked out of the way and a pretense of not knowing what was perfectly obvious. Of course, teachers had to give a few last tests to make life more complicated, but when Dick and Doris crossly complained of one Mrs. Lee called their attention to the fact that after all the main thing required of teachers was to have their pupils accomplish the required work within certain time limits.

“Oh, I suppose they have to,” Doris acknowledged, “but who feels like studying now?”

And Betty, who always felt that she was expected to be an example, fully sympathized with both Dick and Doris, though her only response was a laugh and a few giddy gym steps performed in the dining room just before she left it to rush to school.

There was generous giving toward the Christmas baskets in Christmas week. The teachers’ room, to which contributions this time were brought, had a corner full to overflowing with packages and cans. The Lyon “Y” basket for the adopted family would have to be a bushel basket this time and more than a Christmas dinner would be provided. The display itself was a good reminder and advertisement of kind things afoot. “Oh, yes; I almost forgot that I was to bring a little sack of flour,” one girl said; and a boy, who, naturally, did not belong to the Lyon “Y” put his hand in his pocket to draw out a quarter and say, “Here, Betty Lee; aren’t you president of that crowd?” as he waved his hand toward the heap of supplies. “Get some candy for the kids. Got a quarter, Tom?” And thus Betty added two quarters to the little fund of money. But she did not know that the boy who gave the first quarter had only ten cents left for his lunch. But ten cents would buy something and the feeling of having done something for some one else is a warming one.

This time Chet Dorrance, Chauncey Allen, Kathryn Allen and Betty Lee were the only ones who were on hand to deliver the Christmas basket. “How’ll we ever get everything upstairs?” laughingly asked Betty, viewing the car after everything was stowed away. “There won’t be anybody to watch the car, for we’ll all have to carry something.”

“Don’t worry till we get there, Betty,” Chet advised. “You just leave all the carrying to Chauncey and me.”

“Not a bit of it!” cried Kathryn. “We want to see those little Woods kiddies. Moreover, cars do lock, Betty.”

“We know where to find them this time anyhow,” said Betty.

Again the Allen car wound round the Lyon High drives out upon the wide thoroughfare, making its way down town and out to the district whose buildings and surroundings made it very clear that poverty marked its inhabitants.

The hall which the young people reached after climbing the two flights of rickety stairs gave some evidence of having been cleaned and there was a rush to the door by young feet, they could hear, after the knock which Kathryn gave.

The door was flung open and grins of pleasure welcomed the high school representatives. “We saw you come and Mother said we could open the door,” said the eldest, her eyes big at the array of what had been brought. “Oh, Mother, come! There’s a bushel basket and lots of things!”

“Merry Christmas,” said Betty, smiling at everybody, as she looked past the children at Mrs. Woods, who again appeared with a sleepy baby that she placed upon the bed. The room, in expectation of the guests, had been cleaned as carefully as possible and Mrs. Woods looked as if there was some hope in living now. She was being helped over the hard place.

“No, thanks, we can’t stay,” continued Betty, at the invitation to come in. “We have to get back.” With this she handed Mrs. Woods the small basket she carried and Kathryn put into the hands of the older girl a package she was holding. Chet and Chauncey lugged in the bushel basket. “Don’t let the children see what’s in the little basket till Christmas morning, Mrs. Woods,” said Betty with an air of mystery; and one of the children jumped up and down at that happy suggestion.

Tears came into Mrs. Woods’ eyes. “May God bless you all,” said she. “And there is a chance that he may get work the first of the year, steady work, I mean. He’s out in one of the suburbs now, putting coal in for a man.”

“Oh, tell me, Mrs. Woods, about the Sevillas,” suddenly said Kathryn, more or less embarrassed by Mrs. Woods’ fervent thanks, to which Betty was responding with the wish that everything would “come right” for them.

“Yes,—sure enough. Why the old lady was well pleased to be remembered with a Thanksgiving gift and Rosie did not mind as much as I thought she would. You see it was too late to do anything about it and Rosie was worried about her old mother, too. I guess all they needed was something to eat.

“But all at once one morning Rosie came up to say good-bye and they were moving. Some way or other they had got a new trunk and that and some old grips were all that went out. She brought up a few things she was leaving behind. I couldn’t make out just where they were going from what Rosie said. She didn’t seem to want to tell me anything. I ran down to tell the old lady good-bye; and when Rosie was having the trunk taken out, she said that Rosie was frightened and she didn’t know where they were going, and Rosie didn’t want anybody to know. They were going to the station from here, but she thought they would stay in the city. Anyhow that was what I made out from the bit of English she has finally picked up and her signs with her poor old hands.

“I’ve inquired, though, and Rosie isn’t working or sewing for the folks she did work for and nobody knows anything. So I suppose they did leave town. Only the good Lord knows what will become of them. The only thing I can think of is that Rosie got a job in some other place, and I hope that’s it.”

“Did Rosie ever speak of a brother, or cousin, or any relative at all?” asked Betty.

“Never a word about any one. I never knew anybody as close-mouthed as Rosie. She was asked all sorts of questions by the folks around here, of course, but she never let them get well enough acquainted to keep it up. I didn’t need but a hint myself. I let folks tell what they want to. I like to keep my own business to myself if I can with all these!” Mrs. Woods nodded at the children as she spoke.

“I wish I’d seen Rosie,” thoughtfully said Betty, But it was time to say good-bye and go on to the next duty or pleasure; for this had been a very “Christmasy” day, the girls declared. There had been the last rehearsal for the Christmas play, when the performers were “actually” excused from classes if they had any the “last two bells” or periods. Tomorrow morning the play would be given in two assembly gatherings, in order that the whole school might see it. And that night would listen to the carols.

“Why did you ask about Rosie Sevilla’s relatives?” asked Kathryn of Betty, and Betty for the first time told about the name on the letter from Ramon.

“It may not mean anything and again it might,” said Betty. “Once in a while I feel worried about it. It just seems that I might have missed an opportunity. There is some mystery about Ramon and there seems to be about these people. That’s about the only connection. And they’re Spanish, of course.”

“I wouldn’t worry any, Betty,” said Chet. “You can’t fix up things for everybody.”

“No,” said Betty, “but you can help sometimes, Chet. Oh, isn’t it getting dark? I’m glad we’re out of those streets! Do you think we’ll have snow? I do want snow for Christmas!”

“We still have a little left, Betty,” laughed Kathryn, pointing to a narrow stretch of dark snow and ice that edged the streets and walks, or spread in patches over lawns.

“Oh, that!” exclaimed Betty. “I mean something soft and white and clean.”

“You’re likely to get your wish,” said Chauncey. “There’s one of those gray snow clouds now from where the wind is blowing.”

“Will we go carolling if it snows?” asked Kathryn.

“Of course we shall,” replied the president of the Lyon “Y.” “We have cars and people to drive them and chaperons and everything!”

Another duty was performed. Betty was the first one to be dropped from the Allen car, courteously assisted out by Chet, who would probably have come in a few moments or lingered at the door to talk, if it had not been so near dinner time, and if Chauncey had not privately informed him that no “visiting with best girls” was allowed this time.

And the next day was the “last day of school!”

That welcome day dawned with a few scattered flakes of snow flying in a frosty air. In happy anticipation the Lee children hurried their preparations for school, Betty carefully packing her costume for the play in a light suitcase, which Dick generously offered to carry, provided they “had to take” the street car. It was not always convenient for Mr. Lee to drive his children to school.

“If this goes off as well as the Christmas pageant did at the church, I’ll be satisfied,” said Betty, her cheeks pink with the exercise and excitement about coming events, as they boarded the street car together. The car was packed with boys and girls on their way to school. Doris and Betty secured a strap each and hung on while they nodded to this one or that one whom they knew. “Remind me to tell you a ‘trade last,’ Betty, when we get off the car,” said Mary Emma, who happened to be sitting by Betty’s strap.

“I’ll not forget to do that,” said Betty, breezily. “Who said it?”

“Guess.”

But Betty would not guess, and there was too much noise for conversation; for when large numbers of pupils are together, if manners are remembered at all, older passengers are usually thankful. But these high school pupils, if a bit noisy at times, were an interesting and attractive group that needed only occasional reminders from motorman or conductor when too full of spirits.

Arm in arm with Mary Emma, and carrying her suitcase in her free hand, Betty traversed the walk to the high school building. “It was Budd, Betty,” said Mary Emma. “He said that you would have made the best angel in the play—your hair and eyes and everything—and that it was too bad you hadn’t been in the dramatic club longer and that they had to let a senior girl have the part anyway.”

“Why, wasn’t that nice of old Budd!” cried Betty, pleased. “And the angel has to say things, so it couldn’t be just looks, Budd meant.”

“Suppose it was—wouldn’t that be nice enough?”

“No, Mary Emma. Looks are something you’re born with and can’t help and they’re no credit. See?”

“H’m. You’re a funny girl! So are people born either with brains or without ’em. I don’t agree with you. And I’d rather have looks than brains.”

“Much you would. But as you’re pretty well supplied with both you needn’t worry.”

“I thank you,” said Mary Emma with mock formality, as they separated inside of the door, Mary Emma to seek her locker and home room, Betty to report first with her costume, before she also would join the other junior girls of her home room.

So old Budd thought she would have made a good angel. That was nice. Budd had been at the pageant at the church. He had a part in the play to be given this morning. And as Betty happened to meet him in the hall on her way to her home room, she gave him such a welcoming smile, without realizing it in the least, that Budd was pleasantly surprised. He believed he’d get ahead of old Chet and ask Betty way ahead for something or other in the party line. Say, why couldn’t he take her to that big moving picture that was coming in vacation? It was a proper one that the Lees would let Betty see. They were almost silly about Betty; but perhaps that was what made her sort of different—and independent! Gee-whilikers—but Betty was independent!