Margaret Penrose

“ The bride sank to the floor, and with white, upturned face, lay unconscious.
The men of the party with one thought jumped to the fireplace, and Ned was dragged, by way of the chimney, into the room. Completely dazed, utterly chagrined, and looking altogether foolish, he sat in a round, high basket, his knees crushed under his chin, the clown’s cap rakishly hanging over one ear, his face unrecognizable in its thick coating of cobwebs and soot.
“Oh, we’re so sorry,” Dorothy’s eager young voice broke upon the hushed crowd, as she ran into the room, with Mabel behind her. ”

“ Ned ran into the room. “Hurry, girls,” he said, bowing low, “the motor is at the door.”
“The car!” screamed the girls in delight, “where did the car come from?”
“Oh, just the magic of New York,” said Ned, with a smile.
“Not the Fire Bird?” asked Dorothy, hat pin suspended in mid-air.
“Oh, no, just a car. Maybe you girls like being bumped along on top of the ’bus, but little Neddie likes to have his hand on the wheel himself,” said Ned.
“Running a car in New York,” said Tavia, “is not North Birchland, you know. Maybe we’ll get a worse bump in it than we ever dreamed of on top of the ’bus.” ”

“ The lady, very foreign in manner and attire, held a tiny white basket under her huge sable muff. She gushed prettily at the unexpected pleasure of having Aunt Winnie for a travelling companion. Tavia thought she must be the most beautiful lady in all the world, and both she and Dorothy found it most disconcerting to be ushered into a sleeping car filled with staring people, and be introduced to so lovely a creature as Aunt Winnie’s friend. The beautiful lady whispered mysteriously to Aunt Winnie, and pointed to the hidden basket and instantly a saucy growl came from it. ”

“ Inside the room again the girls scampered.
“Right on the very head of Miss Mingle!” whispered Edna, horror-stricken. “Now we are in for it!”
“But she needed it,” said Tavia, in her absurd way of turning a joke into kindness. “I was afraid she wouldn’t find it.”
“Better be afraid she does not find you,” said Dorothy. “Miss Mingle is a dear, but she won’t like leaky feather beds dropped on her.”
“Well, I suppose we will all have to stand for it,” sighed Edna, “though land knows we never intended to decapitate the little music teacher. And she has a weak spine! Tavia Travers, how could you?” ”

“ THE LOVING CUP
“Hurry, hurry!” cried Tavia, hugging Dorothy. “You awful girl! I’ve been doing everything under the skies to help Aunt Winnie get through the dinner, but I absolutely refuse to carry along the dance! How could you place us all in such a predicament, you angel of mercy! And to leave me to manage those boys in their evening dress! They’re too funny for words! Nat positively looks weird in his; he insists on pulling down the tails, he’s afraid they don’t hang gracefully! And Ned is as stiff and awkward as a small boy at his first party!” ”

“ So Emily was left to her surprises, and now, on the afternoon of the night before Christmas, we find Dorothy and Mabel, with Ned, Nat and Ted, busy with the decorations of the Cedars. Step ladders knocked each other down, as the enthusiastic boys tried to shift more than one to exactly the same spot in the long library. Kitchen chairs toppled over just as Dorothy or Mabel jumped to save their slippered feet, and the long strings of evergreens, with which all hands were struggling, made the room a thing of terror for Mrs. White and Major Dale. ”

“ A HOLD-ON IN NEW YORK
“My! Isn’t it hard to hang on!” breathed Tavia, clinging to Dorothy, as the subway train swung rapidly around the curves. As usual the morning express was crowded to overflowing, and the “overflowers” were squeezed tightly together on the platforms. Ned held Aunt Winnie by the arm and looked daggers at the complacent New Yorkers who sat behind the morning papers, unable to see any persons who might want their seats.
“Such unbearable air! It always makes me faint,” said Aunt Winnie, weakly.
“Let’s get out as quickly as possible,” said Dorothy, “the top of a ’bus for mine!” ”

“ I want to know people for themselves, not for what they’re worth financially or because of the entertaining they do. I just like to know people—and poorer people best of all. They are interesting and real.”
“As are persons of wealth and social position,” answered Aunt Winnie, gently.
“I’m going to be a soldier, like father,” said Joe, “and Dorothy can nurse me when I fall in battle.”
“Me, too,” chirped little Roger, “I want to be a soldier and limp like father!”
“Oh, boys!” cried Dorothy, in horror, “you’ll never, never be trained for war.”
“What’s that?” asked Major Dale. ”

“ A struggling mass of humanity, mostly women, were packed in tightly about one counter. The girls could not get closer than five feet, but patiently they stood waiting their turn to see what wonderful thing was on sale. It was Tavia’s first bargain rush, and for every elbow that was jammed into her ribs, she stepped on someone’s foot. Dorothy held her head high above the crowd to breathe. At last they reached the counter, and the bargains that all were frantically aiming to reach were saucepans at ten cents each. ”

“ Tavia laughed and pranced about as she talked.
“Why will our boys always act so silly in the evening? I really believe if dances were given in the morning, directly after breakfast, the girls would be dull and listless and the men enchanting,” said Dorothy with a laugh, as she stood forth, resplendent in her evening gown of pale blue, ready to make a tardy appearance.
The late arrival of the girl whom all these guests were invited to meet, caused a stir of merriment, which Dorothy met with a certain charm and grace, that was her direct inheritance from Aunt Winnie. ”

“ With intense interest the girls watched the continuous throng pouring into their places. Few of the passing crowd, however, returned the lavish interest that was centered on them from the first floor box; no one in the vast audience knew or cared that two country girls were having their first glimpse of a New York theatre audience. They saw nothing unusual in the eager, smiling young faces, and as Dorothy said to Tavia, only the striking, unique and frightfully unusual would get more than a passing glance from those that journey through New York town. ”

“ There were Ned and Nat, the sons of Mrs. White, Dorothy’s aunt, with whom, after some years spent in Dalton, Dorothy and her father and brothers went to live, in North Birchlands. Tavia was a frequent visitor there, and Tavia and the good-looking boy cousins—well, perhaps you had better find out that part for yourself.
Dorothy was always making friends, and, once she had made them she never lost them. Not that Tavia did not do the same, but she was a girl so fond of doing the unexpected, so ready to cause a laugh, even if at herself, that many persons did not quite know how to take her. ”

“ If there was anything in the world more subduedly rich, or more quietly lavish, than the shop that Dorothy and Tavia entered, the girls from the country could not imagine it. The richest and most costly of all things for which the feminine heart yearns, were displayed here. For the first few moments the girls did not talk. They were silent with the wonder of the costliness on every side. Then Tavia said timidly: “Nothing has a price mark on!”
“Hush!” whispered Dorothy, “they don’t have vulgar prices here. They only sell to persons who never ask prices.” ”

“ Tavia stretched out full length, shoes and all, on the rose-colored divan, Dorothy shook with merry laughter, but Martha, the maid with the ruffled-up apron, turned to the kitchenette to hide her emotion.
“New York is certainly a busy place,” said Ned, finally. “We may get a wireless from home on the clothes line. Tavia, I warn you not to hang handkerchiefs on the roof. It’s tabooed, for—country girls.” ”

“ But a more animated crowd of young people had rarely gathered anywhere. Dorothy, Tavia and Aunt Winnie were noticeable among the crowd, their smart travelling suits and happy smiling faces being good to look upon. Ned, who was to accompany his mother, stood guard over the bags, while they were being checked by the station master. Nat, Ted and Bob, who had come to see them off, pranced about, impatient for the train, and altogether they were making such a racket that an elderly lady picked up her bag and shawls, and quickly searched for a quieter part of the station. ”

“ Dorothy brightened. “I’ve never seen a real, live Bohemian!” she exclaimed, clasping her hands together with ecstasy.
“But we met an actress yesterday,” Tavia said, hesitatingly.
Mrs. Bergham waved her hand in space. “I mean real artists, people who have genius, who are doing wonderful things for the world! We count those among our friends,” she said.
“My!” thought Dorothy, “did Miss Mingle belong to that society? Did she know the geniuses of the world, and yet had never mentioned it to the girls at school?” But Miss Mingle had little to say. ”

“ And to spend all her days just wearing beautiful gowns!”
“She wears them so differently from the others here,” declared Dorothy. “She’s strikingly cool, so far beyond her immediate surroundings.”
“I think she must be a princess,” said Tavia, in a solemn voice, “no one else could look like that and stroll about with such an air!”
“I think she is someone who has been wealthy and is now very poor,” said Dorothy, tenderly. “How she must detest being stared at all day long! This work, no doubt, is all she is fitted for, having been reared to do nothing but wear clothes charmingly.” ”

“ She tiptoed down the hall, opened the outer door, and reached the elevator in safety. She rang, and it seemed almost an hour before the car came up. Elevators are such slow things when one is on an errand that must be done in haste!
Tavia watched Mrs. White’s door, afraid every moment that Dorothy or Aunt Winnie would pop out. But the elevator did finally arrive, and bidding the boy “good morning” Tavia at last felt safe. To what they would say when they discovered that she had gone out alone through the streets of New York city, Tavia gave only a momentary thought. ”

“ A woman, with a grand assortment of large bundles and small children, tried to get them all into her arms at once, preparatory to leaving the resting room, but found it so difficult that she sat down once more and laughed good-naturedly, while the children scrambled about the place, loath to leave such comfortable quarters. Dorothy watched with interest, and wondered how any woman could ever venture out with so many small children clinging to her for protection, to do a day’s shopping. Tavia was more interested in art at that moment. ”

“ But here in New York they were not gallant enough to hide their misery, and the comfortable back of Aunt Winnie was not at all at their disposal, and Tavia’s back they had given up some hours since as hopeless, which left Dorothy as the last thin straw! And Dorothy was too much of a wisp of straw to hide such broad shoulders as Bob’s and Ned’s and entirely too short to hide tall Nat! So they clung together in a corner until Tavia separated them, giving each young man a charming girl to pilot over the slippery floor through the maze of a two-step. ”

“ Finally, breathless and panting, they stopped, and demurely Tavia, for all the world like a prim little girl in Sunday School, sank to a low stool, with Bob at her feet. Nothing could be quieter than Tavia, when Tavia decided on quietness.
“We came over in the biggest sleigh we could find,” said Bob, “so that all could take a drive—Mrs. White and Major Dale too, you know.”
“Oh, no, the young folks don’t want an old fellow like me,” protested Major Dale.
“We just do!” Dorothy replied, resting her head against her father’s arm affectionately. “We simply won’t go unless you and Aunt Winnie come.” ”