The Christmas Makers' Club

—Henry W. Longfellow.

THE next Monday afternoon Elsa and Alice went home from school with Betty to talk over a plan which Elsa had said, with a very mysterious air, that she wanted to tell them about. Finding that the baby was not in the nursery, Betty took her friends to this delightful room, with the flowering geraniums and the little strawberry-birds and the row of dolls, the gay pillows of the window-seat, and the Kate Greenaway paper.

“I should think you would stay here all the time, Betty,” exclaimed Elsa, curling herself into a little heap on the rug, and leaning back against the bed; her eyes began roaming around the “picture-book room,” as she called it to herself.

“I do stay here half of the time,—all night,” Betty answered quickly. “That’s half the time when you have to go to bed at eight o’clock! Now tell us about your secret.” Betty sat down near the door, to guard the approach, and Alice drew a small rocking-chair close to the shelf of plants, so that she could watch the lively little strawberry-birds.

“It’s this,” said Elsa; “when my Uncle Ned was here, last Friday, he asked me ever and ever so much about the Club, and I told him about our dressing dolls for the Convalescent Home children, and about how much they needed money; and he thought it would be nice if we could earn some money,—no matter if it was just a little,—and surprise Miss Ruth, and have it to give to the Convalescent Home with the dolls on Christmas Day.” Elsa’s eyes were shining with interest.

“I know how I can earn some,” cried Betty. “When I especially want to earn money, mother gives me five cents a day for emptying waste-baskets; and I will ask father to let me black his boots. How many days are there before Christmas,—let me see, just fourteen, and the waste-baskets would give me seventy cents, surely. What are you going to do, Elsa, to earn money?”

“Uncle Ned said he would give me fifty cents a week if I would write a four-page letter to him twice a week.”

“That will be a dollar,” said Betty, a little envious at Elsa’s being able to earn more than she. “What will you do, Alice?”

“Mamma sometimes pays me for washing the dishes. If I do them twice a day, she will give me five cents, I think, each day.”

“That will be seventy cents more,” Betty said encouragingly, “and two dollars and forty cents in all.”

“And I’m sure Ben can earn some, shovelling snow and running errands,” cried Alice eagerly.

“I wish grandmother would let me wash dishes or black boots,” sighed Elsa. “Work hurts people’s hands, she says.”

“But we will have at least three dollars, if Ben earns some, too,” Betty said quickly, thinking how tiresome it must be to have to be careful all the time about keeping one’s hands soft and white. “Won’t Miss Ruth be surprised, though!” she added joyfully.

Elsa clasped her slender little hands around her knees: “I know a lovely surprise the Club is going to have;” her violet-gray eyes danced with pleasure.

“O, what is it?” cried both the other girls.

“I mustn’t tell; Uncle Ned told me not to. You see, he asked me what I wanted most for Christmas, and at first I said some little strawberry-birds like Betty’s, and then we talked it over, and he said he couldn’t get them very well in cold weather, and perhaps grandmother wouldn’t like them, so we decided on something even nicer,—something the whole Club will like.”

“I think it’s mean to tell just a little bit, and not tell the rest,” declared Betty.

“But I should think you’d like to know you are going to have something, anyway,” said peacemaker Alice. “Will Miss Ruth like it, too?”

“I think so; I am sure she will,” Elsa answered, joyfully.

Seeing the cloud on Betty’s face, Alice spoke up quickly: “Don’t you think we ought to decide to-day on something to give Miss Ruth for Christmas,—maybe something from all of us?”

“Yes, I’ve been thinking about that,” exclaimed Betty, diverted by the suggestion. “Mother said she would help us decide.” And Betty ran out into the hall, calling “Mother! Mother, dear!”

Presently Mrs. White came into the nursery. Being an affectionate and thoughtful woman, she felt that it was wise not in any way to discourage the generous impulses of the little girls. “How will this plan suit you?” she asked, after they had talked the matter over for a few moments: “Each one of you bring to me the amount of money she can perfectly well afford to give for a present, and no one shall know how much the others give; then all of you go with me some day after vacation begins, and we will choose the present.”

This plan suited the girls perfectly.

“And it makes another surprise,” cried Elsa in great delight. “We have so many now that I am almost getting them mixed up.”

Mrs. White’s motherly heart was rejoiced at Elsa’s brighter, happier face. “The Club and the being with other children are doing her a world of good,” she said to herself wisely.

At noon on Friday, Betty White ran in to see Miss Ruth, solely for the purpose of talking about the Club meeting. “Elsa and I were saying at recess this morning,” she began breathlessly, “that we thought you had forgotten all about the story of the old lady’s doll that you were going to tell us. Will you tell it this afternoon? You can be thinking it up.”

To this Miss Ruth agreed.

Betty had in one hand a fancy-striped paper bag, full of chocolate candy. She held it toward Miss Ruth: “Take some, please. O, take more than one piece! Mother had a birthday yesterday and she gave each of us children two dollars. She hid the money in different places ’round the house, and we had to hunt for it; it was such fun.

“I like mother’s birthdays, ’cause she always gives us something,” Betty rattled on, in her usual lively fashion. “Last year she baked some new silver dollars into a cottage pudding: it looked so heavy that none of us would take any at first, except Max, but when he bit into a dollar and showed it to us, we all took some in a hurry.

“Have some more candy, please,” urged Betty, generously, holding forth the striped bag again. “I bought a lot,—twenty-five cents’ worth out of my two dollars,—so I could have some candy to eat in school. I never get found out. Don’t ever tell, will you?”

“Do I ever tell?” asked Miss Ruth.

“No,” Betty said, with an approving nod, “I don’t believe you ever do.”

“Don’t you think it would be more honourable, however, Betty, since candy-eating is not allowed in school, for you not to take the candy there?” Ruth Warren asked, looking intently into Betty’s face.

Betty lowered her eyes, but did not make any answer.

“Leave the candy here,” suggested Ruth Warren, “and have it for the Club meeting.”

“All—right, I will,” came the rather reluctant but courageous consent.

“Well, it’s ’most school-time and I must go,” cried Betty in her wonted happy manner, a half-moment later. “Thank you for keeping the candy.” She took a last piece by way of reward to herself, and hurried off to school.

There was no Alice with Betty and Elsa when they arrived, soon after three o’clock. “She wasn’t at school this morning, but Ben has gone home to see if she can come,” Betty explained at once.

“Mrs. Holt has just now telephoned me,” Ruth Warren said, “and she tells me that Alice has a feverish cold, so she cannot come to the Club.”

“We might go out there,” Betty suggested.

“But we are not invited,” Ruth Warren replied merrily. “If Alice has a feverish cold, naturally enough her mother would not invite us there.”

“It is too bad,” cried Elsa. “Alice will be so disappointed.” Both she and Betty looked quite downcast, for they were very fond of Alice.

“Can we have the story just the same, or shall we wait?” Betty inquired anxiously.

“We will have the story,” replied Miss Ruth, “because I shall go out to see Alice to-morrow, and if she would like, I will tell it to her there.”

“Please begin now, then,” urged Betty.

“But first I want to show you what I have for the Club to work upon,” said Miss Ruth, beginning to undo the wrappings of a large, flat pasteboard box which stood upon the table.

“O, goody!” cried Betty, who had been eying the box with lively curiosity.

“Paper dolls!” exclaimed Elsa, clasping her hands in rapturous delight, as the box-cover came off.

“What beauties!” Betty said, dancing a quick-step in her excitement.

There were twelve sets of dolls, all fully dressed, and with extra costumes, ready to be painted.

“All those dresses,—all the hats, too, to be painted,” said Elsa, in great glee.

“What fun! What fun!” cried Betty, whirling around like a lively top, while Miss Ruth took from the box a large tin case of water-colour paints and several brushes, and placed them upon some sheets of blotting-paper which already covered the polished mahogany table.

Betty had just been out to the kitchen for some water,—at Miss Ruth’s suggestion and to grim-faced Sarah’s great delight,—and she was filling the paint saucers when she glanced up at the sound of loud sleigh-bells and cried out: “Why! there is Alice!”

“It can’t be Alice!” said Elsa, following Betty to the window.

“It’s the Holts’ hired man, grinning from ear to ear, and Alice with him,” insisted Betty. “She has just jumped out of the sleigh.”

The bell rang, and in a surprisingly short time Sarah appeared at the library door, trying hard not to burst out laughing; for behind her came Ben, very red in the face, dressed in a brown sailor-suit of Alice’s, and looking so sheepish and so comical that Miss Ruth joined in the general laugh, and Sarah went off chuckling, with her white apron up to her face.

“Peggy felt so bad because she couldn’t come that I put on one of her old dresses over my own clothes, just for fun, to make her laugh,” said Ben, hanging his head, but marching bravely into the room.

“I shouldn’t think you’d want to wear girls’ clothes and come to a girls’ Club,” said Betty teasingly.

“Girls are all right, most of the time,” Ben answered. “They’re too afraid of their clothes to be as nice as boys, all the time. This is awful tight; mother said she knew something would happen to it;” he was still very red in the face.

Something had happened already, for one of the sleeves had partly ripped from the blouse waist. Noticing this, Ruth Warren noticed also a tumultuous movement under the blouse, suggestive of sobs. But Ben’s smiling, ruddy face showed no signs of grief. A half-moment later, a tiny, furry head with bright bead-like eyes, looked out above the blouse collar.

In her usual tone Miss Ruth said: “I see you have brought one of your pets with you, Ben.”

Ben made a quick movement, but not quick enough to prevent a gray squirrel from springing out of his attempted grasp, upon the window-sill.

Elsa jumped, and Betty cried: “Ben Holt! How mean of you! Poor little squirrel!”

The squirrel’s heart was thumping wildly under the soft fur of his chest, and his breath came in quick gasps as he turned his head rapidly from side to side, searching a chance to escape.

“Is he your tame squirrel, Ben?” Ruth Warren inquired.

“Not exactly; you see we’ve been feeding him from the dining-room window, so he’s quite tame,” explained Ben, “and—and I caught him on the wood-pile, with some nuts, and brought him along to see if the girls would be frightened.”

“O, that is it,” was all Ruth Warren said, but Ben’s face grew redder than ever.

Making a sudden leap, the squirrel landed on top of the tall bookcase. From here he gave another leap to the top of a window, and began scolding loudly.

“I will bring some walnuts, Ben, so that you can capture this frightened little creature and take him home,” Miss Ruth said, going to the pantry.

“Now aren’t you sorry, Ben?” teased Betty.

The relish of the joke was indeed gone for Ben, but he faced the music bravely, for, though often heedless, he was no coward. When Miss Ruth came back with the walnuts, he asked the girls to keep quiet, and in a few moments coaxed Mr. Squirrel down from the window-top to the mantel, where he sat with his bushy tail curled up over his back, turning a nut-meat round and round in his paws as he ate it, listening and watching intently.

It was hard for Betty and Elsa to keep from laughing, and even Miss Ruth had difficulty in keeping her face sober, for Ben in his sister’s short-skirted dress, which hardly came to his knees,—leaving an extra long pair of thin legs which ended in good-sized feet,—was an exceedingly droll sight. A giggle from Betty at the critical moment sent the squirrel flying to the curtain-top again; but greedy hunger conquered fear, and growing venturesome again, the squirrel came by cautious degrees down to the window-sill. While he sat there, filling his cheek pouches with the cracked walnuts, Ben, who had been close at hand all the while, deftly captured him and tucked him away securely into the blouse waist.

“Now, if one of you girls will unfasten this old dress skirt, I’ll drop it off,” Ben said meekly, after struggling to unbutton the skirt with one hand while holding the squirrel fast with the other. “I can’t go through the streets with a skirt on,” he added, shamefacedly.

Miss Ruth unfastened the waist-band buttons, the skirt dropped to the floor, and Ben stood there in the middle of the room, looking even funnier than ever in his dark blue knickerbockers and the brown blouse waist. Miss Ruth mercifully and quickly helped him into the old blue reefer jacket, which was so tight now that he could not button it at all.

“I should be glad to have you come back to the Club meeting, after you have taken the squirrel home, Ben,” Miss Ruth said, with the double purpose of making sure that the squirrel reached his headquarters and of giving Ben a share in the meeting if he really wanted to come back. “Will you ask Alice if she would like some of the paper dolls to paint, and if she would, you could take them to her,” she added.

“Yes, I will come back,” Ben answered, with a brightening face. “I’d like to—anyway—and Peggy would be disappointed not to know all about the meeting.”

“I am going to tell the Club a story I promised them. It is only about a little old lady’s doll; but if you would like to hear it, I will wait till you come.”

“Yes, ma’am, I should like to hear it, thank you,” replied Ben most humbly.

“Alice said you like dolls, Ben,” cried Betty mischievously.

“I don’t care,—I do like dolls sometimes. I ducked a boy into the frog-pond once—” began Ben; but he stopped and burst out laughing, for Miss Ruth had given him a queer look, and now she was saying: “It seems to me we have heard about that before, Ben.”

“Hurry, Ben,” exclaimed Elsa, impatient for the story. “Hurry home and hurry back again.”

“Perhaps I can find our hired man on the road with Jerry,” called out Ben, as he left the room, “and then I’d go flying home and back quicker than a flash.”

“Or a squirrel,” added Miss Ruth. “Be careful of the squirrel, Ben.”

Both Elsa and Betty wanted some advice about the colours of paints to use first, so the time did not seem very long to them before Ben returned,—a most penitent-faced boy now, and in his own clothes.

Ben walked straight up to Miss Ruth, made his best bow, and said in a manly way, though very fast: “Mother says I must beg your pardon for bringing the squirrel. I am sorry I did it.”

“I think you frightened the squirrel more than you did the girls, Ben,” Miss Ruth replied, feeling that the boy had already done sufficient penance for his attempted fun.

Ben drew a long breath of relief. “I had a ride both ways,” he said, quite cheerfully. “May I paint, too?” he inquired, turning to look at the tempting array upon the table, and also at the plateful of thin sandwiches which Miss Ruth had wisely provided to go with Betty’s candy.

“Yes, indeed,” Miss Ruth answered. “How would you like to paint the shoes on the dolls? Take some sandwiches, children.”

“I will black their boots for them,” cried Ben merrily, as he helped himself to a chicken sandwich and a paint-brush.

“Betty brought the candy,” said Miss Ruth, for Ben, somehow, was ready for a piece in a flash. Then Betty bravely made the explanation.

“Peggy says she will do all the painting you want her to. She can’t hardly wait for it.” Ben suddenly remembered the message.

“We can’t hardly wait for that story! Please, please, begin!” entreated Betty.

This is a true story, children,—said Ruth Warren, going toward the hearth, where a bright wood-fire burned steadily, and wheeling a deep, comfortable chair half around so that she might watch the children at their work:—The winter that I was eleven years old, my father had to go to California. My mother went with him, and as it would have been a rather long, hard journey for a child, they left me with my grandmother, who lived in a roomy, old-fashioned house just on the border of a large town. I was not very well that winter, and the doctor had said I must not go to school, but must be out-of-doors all that I could. I remember this half made up to me for having my father and mother go away—or I tried to think it did.

About three minutes’ walk from my grandmother’s, Miss Phœbe Dean, a little old lady who had been a school-teacher in her younger days, lived all alone in a snug, small story-and-a-half house. Miss Dean owned the house, but she was rather poor and not very strong. Grandmother used to send broths and jellies and things of that kind to her, every few days, and as I had no school lessons to take my time, grandmother generally sent the things by me.

Miss Dean was very friendly. She had all sorts of quaint, interesting curiosities in her house, for her father had been around the world several times as captain of his own ship and had brought home many treasures; sometimes she would open an old carved chest and show me wonderful pictures and beautiful embroideries. Before long, she and I were such good friends that I went to see her almost every day, whether or not grandmother had anything to send.

The bedroom which I slept in at my grandmother’s had a dormer window facing toward Miss Dean’s house; and Miss Dean told me that she used to watch for my light every night at my bedtime. Grandmother had made Miss Dean promise that if she ever was ill at night, and wanted help, she would put two candles side by side in her front window. One night, after grandmother had put out my light and tucked me into bed, I looked toward Miss Dean’s house, thinking that she was thinking about me; and I felt sure that I saw two candles in her front window. There were a few flakes of snow falling, and the lights looked rather dim, but I was sure they were there, and meant that Miss Dean was ill.

I called down to grandmother. She came up-stairs to look, and then we both looked, but now neither one of us could see any light. Grandmother said: “You imagined you saw the two candles, Ruth.”

“No, grandmother,” I insisted. “I am sure I saw them.”

Grandmother laughed and called me a foolish little girl; but, to comfort me, said she would sit near the window down-stairs and look out every now and then toward Miss Dean’s house. I kept my eyes on her window, by propping myself up in bed, with the pillows, until by and by I grew too sleepy to keep my eyes open,—especially as I did not see the candles again.

The next morning there was deep snow over everything. And because grandmother’s house was on the border of the town, the streets were not cleared of snow until noonday. I kept thinking and talking about Miss Dean so much that about eleven o’clock grandmother said: “Put on your rubber boots, Ruth, and go over to see her, if you want to.”

In about a minute I had on those rubber boots and my thick red coat, and was wading in the snow, quite to my knees, toward the little white house. It took me so long that two or three times I almost gave it up, because I was used to running over in such a short time. But I kept on, and finally came to Miss Dean’s green-and-white gate. There were no foot-tracks in the front yard, and the snow was so deep that I could hardly find the door-steps. When I did find them, I began pounding on the front door—Miss Dean did not have any door-bell—and very soon I saw her all bundled up in a shawl, looking out of the window to see who it was, before she unlocked the door.

Poor little old lady! She led me into the sitting-room, where she slept in the winter. “I shall have to go back to bed, dear,” she said in her sweet way; “I have had a dreadful pain in my head ever since yesterday afternoon.”

“Then you did put the two candles at the window last night?” I asked eagerly.

“Yes, dear, for a little while,” she said in a weak voice as she sank back against her pillows. “But when I saw that it was snowing, I took the candles away so as not to disturb your grandmother, for I thought the hired man and his wife might be gone down town, and she would have no one to send over.”

“Is there anything I can do for you?” I asked, for she had closed her eyes as if she were suffering. Half-frightened by her white face, I looked away from the bed; and there in a little rocking-chair what did I see but a black-eyed doll, dressed in a long, clean white flannel nightgown and with a red shawl pinned around her.

“You might get some hot water from the tea-kettle on the kitchen stove,” said Miss Dean, without opening her eyes, “and put a teaspoonful of peppermint essence out of that bottle on the table into a half glass of water. That might make me feel better.”

I hurried out to the kitchen and brought back the hot mixture. Miss Dean took it all, then settled down again among the pillows; but she did not look so pale now. “I shall soon feel better,” she said in her pretty, patient way.

So I waited, seating myself opposite that doll. It had a china head with such black hair, big black eyes and a round face, very white except the bright red cheeks and lips. It was a pretty, lovable doll, and I knew it must be a very old one.

“You are looking at my doll, Ruth,” Miss Dean said suddenly; and turning, I found her eyes fixed upon my face.

“Is it your doll?” I cried.

“Yes,” she said softly. She had large brown eyes and a delicate face; her eyes seemed larger than ever now, because her face was so white.

“It is my doll,” Miss Dean repeated. “Would you like to hold her?”

I had been longing to take that quaint, white-nightgowned doll into my arms. So I jumped up quickly and brought her back with me to the chair by the bed. Probably my face showed how I loved that old china doll on the spot. Anyway, after Miss Dean had watched me holding it a little while, she said: “That peppermint makes my head feel better. I will tell you about the doll.”

“What is her name?” I asked.

“Susie,” Miss Dean said, “and I have had her ever since I was five years old. The way I happen to keep her out now is this: You see, when I was younger, I used to teach children, year after year, different ones, of course. I used to think that maybe if I married and had a little daughter of my own, I would name her Susie,—my mother’s name was Susan. But I grew older, and I didn’t marry, and then, after a time, I had to give up school-teaching. My father and my mother had died, and I missed the children more and more.

“One day when it was very stormy and I was dreadfully, desperately lonely, without a human being around, I went to the old trunk under the eaves, where I had put my dolls away when I was fourteen years old, and I took Susie out for just that day. And having that doll with me made me feel so much happier that, afterward, every once in awhile, when I grew lonely, I would take her out again. I made some new dresses and nightgowns for her, because it didn’t seem quite fair not to treat her well when she gave me so much pleasure.

“Then, two or three years ago,”—Miss Dean went on; and her large brown eyes began to grow very bright now,—“I put Susie into that little rocking-chair one snowy night when I went to bed; and it was so pleasant to wake up in the morning and find her there that I began to have her out every night. By day I always put her into the bureau drawer, because I thought if people saw her, they wouldn’t understand. I should have put her away this morning when you came, only I was suffering so, I forgot her.”

“But I understand,” I said very quickly. “I am sure that if I lived alone, I should do just the same.”

“So should I. Wasn’t Miss Dean dear?” said Elsa, pushing back her cloudy golden hair as Miss Ruth stopped a moment to put a bit of fallen wood again into the fire.

“Why didn’t she have more than one doll?” Betty asked, thoughtfully, splashing her brush into the water.

“Because one is enough,” said Elsa instantly.

“Everybody likes one best,” explained Ben, with the wisdom of ten and a half years.

After Miss Dean had told me about Susie,—continued Ruth Warren, leaning comfortably back into her chair again,—she asked me if I would like to see Susie’s dresses. I said yes, of course, and she told me to open the lower drawer of the bureau. Such a quantity of pretty things as I found! I dressed and undressed Susie to my heart’s content, putting on first a plaid silk gown, then a checked blue-and-white gingham and a funny little Red Riding-hood suit; and finally I put Susie back into her white nightgown, for I felt that Miss Dean would probably rather choose her dress for the day. And very soon I said I must go.

“Can’t you stop and have a little bit of dinner—a kind of lunch—with me?” Miss Dean asked. “If you will put some biscuits into the oven to warm, and make some tea, I will dress myself, and we can have that with some cold ham and jelly.”

I said I could stay,—for I knew grandmother wouldn’t mind. So Miss Dean told me where the biscuit and tea were, and by the time I had them ready, she came out into the kitchen, dressed in a gray flannel wrapper with light blue trimmings. She made me think of a doll, she was so small and so dainty;—she was one of the daintiest people I have ever known, with white, beautifully shaped hands and soft, silky hair—

“She makes me think of Elsa,” said Betty, with a little sigh, half of envy, half of appreciation.

“Don’t interrupt, please, Betty,” Elsa entreated, unmindful of what Betty had said.

Everything about Miss Dean’s house was as dainty as Miss Dean herself—resumed the story-teller;—and everything in the house seemed small, like herself,—tables, chairs, lamps, vases, kitchen stove, even the dishes we ate out of. We had a good luncheon, I remember, and Miss Dean kept me interested, as she always did, with stories of what had happened long ago. After we finished eating, she leaned her head back against her chair in a tired way—she sat at the table in a little rocking-chair—and she said in a wistful voice: “I have been thinking about my poor hens. Not a bit of corn or water have they had since yesterday, and I don’t dare go out to feed them because my head is so dizzy that I am afraid of falling.”

“O, let me feed them,” I begged instantly.

“But they will be afraid of you,” she said; “they are used to seeing my clothes.”

“I can dress up in your clothes,” I said. “O, do let me, please!”

Miss Dean liked a little fun, and she did want her hens fed. So she showed me where she kept her “chicken clothes”—as she called them,—a short brown skirt and a square plaid shawl that she wore over her head and shoulders. The skirt was long for me and the shawl made my head dreadfully hot. But we both laughed over it, and Miss Dean said she was glad to know how she looked. Then she told me not to flop my arms around, because that would frighten the hens. So, with a pail of water and two quarts of corn, I made my way to the hen-house, which was just beyond a little shed. By the time I arrived, I had forgotten not to flop my arms, and the hens grew rather excited and lively, but they were too hungry and thirsty to care much who fed them. After that, I hunted around and found over a dozen white eggs, some of them quite warm, I remember. I tripped upon the brown skirt, going back, and let one egg fall out of the corn measure.

“The dolls’ shoes are all blacked,” exclaimed Ben, rising suddenly and stretching himself, boy-fashion. “May I take a sofa pillow and lie down in front of the fire?” he asked, coming toward Miss Ruth.

“Make yourself comfortable, Ben,” she answered readily; which Ben accordingly did.

“Excuse my interrupting,” he said, in a low tone; “and please go on.”

Miss Dean told me that breaking the egg did not matter,—that she often broke more than one, though I knew she said this just to make me feel better. “I have brought something out for you,” she said, after I had taken off the brown skirt and the stifling plaid shawl, and she was counting the eggs. I saw on the kitchen table a black-and-gold lacquered box, neither large nor small. It looked so interesting that I wanted to open it at once, but Miss Dean began talking about the hens.

I happened to see by the kitchen clock that it was almost three o’clock, and I knew that I ought to be going, for, though I sometimes stayed to lunch with Miss Dean, grandmother always said for me to come home immediately.

You may imagine how much I wanted to see what was in that beautiful lacquered box; but I said that I must go home. I hurried into the bedroom for my coat and Miss Dean followed me. I saw that she had dressed Susie in the blue-and-white gingham frock while I had been out feeding the hens.

“I will come over to-morrow,” I said, as Miss Dean helped me on with my coat. She noticed me looking at Susie,—although I was not thinking of the doll just then.

“Do you mind, dear, not telling any one about Susie?” Miss Dean asked in a timid voice.

“I will not tell anybody at all,” I remember I said, slowly, as I went, slowly also, out of the front door, hoping that Miss Dean would call me back to give me that box.

“Have you light enough for your painting, girls?” Miss Ruth stopped to ask. The daylight had suddenly begun to disappear.

“Let’s stop now; I have done three sets,” said Betty, dropping her paint-brush.

“I have finished two.” Elsa straightened back her shoulders and stretched her arms.

Miss Ruth reached over to the couch and pulled two cushions down upon the hearth-rug. “You have both done splendidly, and so has Ben. Sit here and rest yourselves now,” she said.

“Don’t waste any time from the story, please,” Betty said in a loud whisper as she seated herself, Turk-fashion, on the large square cushion and leaned her head against Miss Ruth’s knees.

“Didn’t Miss Dean give you the box, or even show it to you that day?” inquired Ben, who was lying flat upon his stomach, looking into the fire.

“No,” replied Miss Ruth, “not that day.”

“I think she was mean to forget it,” said out-spoken Betty.

“Wait till we’ve heard the end of the story,” exclaimed Elsa, who had curled up on her cushion against the heavy brass stand which held the fire-tongs and shovel.

“Do you know the end of it?” Betty asked quickly.

“No,—only I know anybody so nice as Miss Dean will be the same at the end,” Elsa said, with a very earnest expression in her eyes.

“I’ll bet I know what was in that box,” cried Ben, from his position on the centre of the rug.

“What?” asked Betty.

“Hens’ eggs to hatch,” Ben replied confidently.

“The idea!” exclaimed Betty. “Just as if Miss Dean would have given a girl hens’ eggs for a present! Now keep still, Ben.”

“We can have only a bit more of the story to-day, because it is almost five o’clock,” said Miss Ruth, putting her hand softly over Betty’s mouth, which began to frame an objecting “O!” Then she continued:

When I came home from Miss Dean’s, grandmother felt dreadfully to think that the little old lady had been ill there all alone by herself. “I must send her some nourishing things to eat,” said grandmother; “I would have Barker go now”—he was the hired man—“but he is off hauling wood, and Jenny”—that was his wife—“has a bad cold.”

I said “O, grandmother, let me go!” For I was wondering, harder than ever, what was in the lacquered box. But grandmother said, “No, child, you have been out enough to-day in this bad walking. You may go over, though, early in the morning.”

The clock pealed out five as Miss Ruth stopped with these words.

“Just a little more,” urged Betty.

“This will be a good place to begin again,” said Miss Ruth; “we will have the rest of the story at the next Club meeting, if you like.”

“I want it now,” insisted Betty; “I can stay.”

“But I can’t,” said Ben, “only about a minute longer. I will think the first part over, going home, to tell Alice.”

“I hope she can come to the next meeting,” said Elsa, with a loyal thought for her little friend.

“You must tell her, Ben, that we have missed her a great deal,” Miss Ruth said.

“And give her the Club’s love,” added Elsa.

“I like to have you do that,” said Betty, who had given up teasing and suddenly grown very quiet as Miss Ruth passed her hand slowly over the rumpled brown hair.

Elsa looked on, from her seat against the tall brass fire-stand. She was too loving-natured to be jealous, but she would have dearly liked to be in Betty’s place, there against Miss Ruth’s knees. Still, Elsa was very happy. Miss Ruth’s dark red dress was so warm-looking in the firelight, and the room seemed so pleasant; it was restful and delightful just to be there. Elsa felt this keenly, although she would not have been able to put it into words.

“Do you know what fire-sparks are?” asked Ben, who was leaning on his elbows with his chin in his hands, and looking straight into the glowing fire. “Sparks are the sunbeams that got shut up in the wood while the tree was growing, and now they are going up the chimney and back into the air again.”

Sarah Judd, passing the library door to light the hall lamp, looked in for a moment, unnoticed by the Club. “It do seem good to see them children stretched out in front of the fire and havin’ such a good time,” she said to herself, with one of the unexpectedly cracking-like smiles upon her grim face.

The day after this meeting of the Club Miss Virginia Warren took a cold from having her room overheated. “I am really worried about myself,” she said after her niece had spent most of the day trying to make her comfortable.

“But the doctor says it is only a cold, and that your heart is in no danger,” said Ruth Warren; “to be sure, a cold is uncomfortable enough to make one wretched,” she added. “Let me open that farther window; a little fresh air will make you feel better.”

“O, no, no!” cried Miss Virginia, drawing her thick white shawl closer around herself at the thought. “Don’t excite me so, Ruth. There’s no telling what may happen. My heart seems very feeble,” she went on, after trying for a half-moment to count the pulse-beats in her own wrist. “I am more and more certain that I must have a nurse to watch my pulse and look out every moment for draughts. Yes, I really must ask you now to see about a nurse,” added Miss Virginia, clasping one large hand over the other wrist to keep track of her heart-beats.

Ruth Warren consulted the doctor.

“Your aunt doesn’t need a nurse any more than you or I need one,” he said, gruffly. “Better have one, though, and I will order her to open the windows every hour of the day. We will give your aunt a little training, and it may do her good.”

As a result of this conversation, and of a plan which she found she could carry out, Ruth Warren called a few days later at Mrs. Danforth’s.

“Mrs. Danforth isn’t very well to-day, miss, and she asks will you come up to her room, please,” said Cummings; so Ruth Warren followed the stiff-backed maid up the polished stairs. From the top of the stairs she saw, just ahead, a room all furnished in white, which she knew must be Elsa’s. “What an unpretty room for a child!” she said to herself.

Mrs. Danforth had on a beautiful white dressing-gown with long lace ruffles hanging from the sleeves, and she was leaning back in a blue velvet chair. “She does not look so ill as unhappy,” Ruth Warren thought to herself.

Not wishing to take any more time than was necessary, Ruth Warren began at once to give the reason for her call:

“Elsa has told me, Mrs. Danforth, of a nurse she once had by the name of Bettina March. Curiously enough, I find that this same Bettina March has quite lately been employed at the Convalescent Home here in Berkeley. She was very much liked, but she was not strong, and went away, hoping to return. She is not yet able to take up the work, and she is anxious to find some occupation which will give her, for a time, less active duties.”

“Well, and what of it?” inquired Mrs. Danforth coldly, fixing her eyes upon her visitor’s face. She and Miss Ruth had exchanged calls formally; that was all the acquaintance they had, save a chance meeting, now and then.

“I should not have intruded upon you with a personal matter, Mrs. Danforth, except for good reason,” Ruth Warren said quietly. “My Aunt Virginia, who, as you know, lives with me, feels the need of having a nurse; it will be an easy position and one which Bettina March can easily fill, as my aunt is by no means very ill. I came to ask if you have any objection to my engaging Bettina March?”

“Is it that you wish to inquire of me in regard to Bettina March’s character?” demanded Mrs. Danforth. “I know nothing against her.”

Now Mrs. Danforth was accustomed to have people a little afraid of her. She was rather surprised, therefore, to find that Ruth Warren did not show any embarrassment, but went on, in a quite simple and perfectly self-possessed manner, to say: “It is not that, Mrs. Danforth. The head-nurse at the Convalescent Home has satisfied me entirely with regard to the woman’s character. It is only on Elsa’s account that I have come to you.”

“Why should I object to your employing Bettina March on Elsa’s account?” Mrs. Danforth made things as hard as she could for Ruth Warren.

“Because my house is next to yours, and Elsa has told me that you were unwilling to have her keep up any acquaintance with her old nurse,” Ruth Warren replied, in the same even-toned voice.

Mrs. Danforth felt now obliged to explain. “Bettina March was nurse to Elsa’s mother during her last illness, and after the mother died stayed on with Elsa until her father died. I felt that the child was growing too dependent on the woman. Elsa is almost entirely without relatives. Her mother was an only child, and her father had only one brother, Mr. Ned Danforth. If he should marry, or if I should die, Elsa would be quite alone in the world and she would need to be self-reliant. I did not think she was a child who would talk over my affairs,” Mrs. Danforth remarked haughtily.

Ruth Warren could not let Elsa stand in a false light before her grandmother’s eyes. Therefore she suddenly decided to tell the story of the child’s grief over the giving away of her doll.

The coldness of Mrs. Danforth’s blue eyes gave way, little by little, to a softer expression as Ruth Warren described Elsa’s visit to her, that late evening.

“So she was brave enough to go out of the house alone at night, and she kept the loss of the doll from me for fear it would hurt my feelings,” said Mrs. Danforth half to herself, toying with a silver paper-cutter the while. “Of course I did not know that the child cared anything about the doll.”

“That is what Elsa said,” returned Ruth Warren, quite eagerly now. Then she went on in a lower tone: “Elsa seems to me a keenly sensitive, thoughtful and affectionate-natured little girl, but very much repressed. As I have observed her—her shyness and her pale face—I cannot help thinking that what she needs more than anything else is to have some love shown her, and to feel free to show her own affection.” Ruth Warren rose to go, feeling that perhaps she had said too much.

“Wait a moment,” said Mrs. Danforth, not unkindly. “You mean to tell me that I am too severe with the child?” She remembered, with an uncomfortable feeling, that Mrs. White had said much the same thing.

“Not too severe in the matter of discipline, but—” Ruth Warren left the sentence unfinished.

“On the whole, I thank you, Miss Warren,” said Mrs. Danforth slowly. “I am sure you have Elsa’s best interest at heart. I am grateful to you for taking charge of the little Club. It has made me feel safe in regard to her. Do you think that the Holt children are perfectly suitable companions for Elsa, in every way?” she asked suddenly.

“They are perfectly suitable companions for any children, I am sure,” Ruth Warren said warmly. “They are charming little children, well-trained and gentle-mannered. The boy is mischievous, but he is perhaps all the more likeable for his liveliness, and he is very manly with his mother and his little sister. I have seen the mother several times, and I have never met a more attractive or charming woman,—or a braver woman.”

A quick flush reddened Mrs. Danforth’s face, then died away as suddenly as it came. Reaching out a trembling hand, she rang for her maid, who appeared as if she had risen out of the blue velvet carpeted floor.

“Cummings, some water,” said Mrs. Danforth, with an evident effort. Then she leaned back against her chair and closed her eyes.

Ruth Warren had started to leave the room, but fearing lest Mrs. Danforth should faint, she stood waiting for Cummings to return.

As she waited, she noticed, half unconsciously at first, then with a quick start of interest, an oil-painting hanging upon the softly tinted wall, back of Mrs. Danforth’s chair,—an oil-painting of a large, gable-windowed house, exactly like the one at Mrs. Holt’s. Ruth Warren remembered it particularly because of one small red-leaved maple tree at the left-hand corner of the picture; and she also remembered Elsa’s exclamation over Mrs. Holt’s picture. She looked again at Mrs. Danforth’s white, set face, and a haunting resemblance flashed through her mind, leaving her fairly bewildered.

Just then Cummings came in with a glass of water. Mrs. Danforth opened her eyes, drank the water, and appeared instantly better. “I have these dizzy attacks once in a while, Miss Warren,” she said in her usual stately manner, “but they pass off quickly. I am sorry this happened while you were here. Thank you for coming. I am sure you will find Bettina March a very useful woman.”

Then Ruth Warren, turning many things over in her mind, went home, leaving Mrs. Danforth to her pride and loneliness.

It had chanced that, coming from a drive by way of Berkeley Avenue the day before, and having Elsa with her, Mrs. Danforth had met a young, fair-haired, plainly dressed woman walking along slowly between a boy and a girl who looked very much alike, although the boy was the taller.

Mrs. Holt had been to the shops that afternoon with her children, and in the basket which Ben was carrying so carefully, were the precious Christmas remembrances they had bought for the dear father out in Colorado. Mrs. Holt’s face was unusually sad, for this would be the first Christmas that she had ever been parted from her husband, and she felt the separation more and more keenly as the days drew near to Christmas.

Elsa had leaned forward and waved eagerly behind the closed window of the coupé. The twins had smilingly waved their hands in turn. The tired-looking, sad-faced mother, in bowing to Elsa, had given a sudden, startled look at Mrs. Danforth.

The encounter had been over in a half-moment, for the strong gray horse was going swiftly toward home.

“It is Alice and Ben and their mother, grandmother,” Elsa had cried excitedly. “Don’t you remember about ‘Sweet Alice and Ben Bolt?’ Only their name is Holt.”

Fearing that her grandmother’s silence meant reproof, Elsa had looked around. Mrs. Danforth was sitting very white-faced and rigid, against the coupé cushions. She did not speak again during the drive.

This was the first time that Mrs. Danforth and Mrs. Holt had met, face to face, in Berkeley; and it was the memory of this meeting, which Mrs. Danforth could not put out of her mind, that kept her in her own room the next day. Through shutting out love from her life, Mrs. Danforth had burnt her heart almost to ashes.