I ran down into the hall and took up my position in the centre of it; but when I heard the key turn in the latch of the inside door I wanted to run away and hide. I had never felt so beautiful.

My father stopped short when he saw me. 'By the Lord!' he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.

'Why, George!'

My mother was on the stairs.

'Well, by the Great Guns then--you're a--a vision, Marty.' I could only grin.

'Here's some more pinkness for you to wear,' he said, producing a long tissue-paper package that he had been holding behind his back. He chuckled as he unwrapped it. 'Twelve, Marty; twelve solid pink carnations. What do you say to 'em? Show your mother.'

I said nothing. I only jiggled on my toes.

'George, dear, what made you? A little child like that can't wear flowers--and they're seventy-five cents a dozen!'

All the chuckle went out of my father's eyes: he looked at me, then at the carnations, then at my mother, just like a little boy who finds that after all he's done the wrong thing. I wanted to run and take his hand; but while I stood, wanting and not daring, my mother had crossed the hall and was putting her arms around his neck.

'They're beautiful, George dear. She can wear three or four of them, anyway. They will make her so happy, and the rest we'll put in her room.

Her room is pink too.'

'So it is.' He kissed my mother and then me. 'Say your piece, Marty--quick! Before we have supper.'

I had learned my piece so thoroughly that the order was like turning on a spigot. Four verses, four lines in each, gushed forth.

My father clapped. 'Now for something to eat,' he said.

Immediately after supper my mother and I set out, leaving my father to shave and come later. It was a cold night with a great many bright stars. At the corner we met Luella and her mother. Luella's mother was carrying over her arm Luella's spring coat, her everyday one, a dark blue reefer.

'Martha ought to have hers along, too,' said my Aunt Emma. 'If the church should be chilly they'll catch their death sitting in thin dresses.'

My mother thought it was probable we would. So I was sent back to hunt for my little reefer. It was like Luella's, dark blue with tarnished gilt anchors on the corners of the sailor collar, and like hers it was second-best and outgrown.

Luella and I parted with our mothers at the door of the Sunday school room.

'Don't forget to take your reefers when you march in,' admonished my Aunt Emma.

'Must we carry them while we march?' I almost wailed.

My mother came to the rescue. 'Hold them down between you and the little girl you march with. Then no one will see.'

'Yes'm.' I was much relieved.

The Sunday school was a hubbub of noise and pink and blue hair-ribbons.

In among the ribbons, and responsible for some of the noise, were close-cropped heads and white collars and very new ties, but you didn't notice them much. There were so many pink and blue ribbons. After a while the room quieted down and we formed in line. Miss Miriam, who even that night wore a black dress and her little gold cross, distributed among us the eight silk banners which, when we weren't marching, always hung on the walls of the Sunday school rooms. There were subdued whispers and last prinkings. Then the piano, which had been moved into the church, gave the signal and we marched in.

We marched with our banners and our pink and blue hair-ribbons up and down the aisles so that all the Mothers-and-Fathers-and-Friends-of-the-School could see us. Whenever we recognized our own special mother or father, we beamed. The marching finally brought us to the pews a.s.signed to our respective cla.s.ses.

Luella's cla.s.s and mine were to sit together that night. I turned round--almost every little girl, after she was seated and had sufficiently smoothed out skirts and sash, turned round--and saw that my mother and aunt were only two pews behind us. I grinned delightedly at them, and they both nodded back. Then I told Luella. After that I settled down.

The church was decorated with ropes of green and with holly wreaths. At either side of the platform was a Christmas tree with bits of cotton-batting scattered over it to represent snow. I had heard that there were to be two Christmas trees, and I had looked forward to a dazzling glitter of colored b.a.l.l.s and tinsel and candles, maybe. The cotton-batting was a little disappointing. It made you feel that it was not a real Christmas tree, but just a church Christmas tree. Church things were seldom real. The Boys Brigade of our church carried interesting-looking cartridge-boxes, that made them look like real soldiers; but when they drilled you found out that the cartridge-boxes were only make-believe. They held Bibles. Still, the cotton-batting did make you think of snow.

After what seemed like a very long wait the entertainment began. The minister, of course, opened it with prayer. Then we all sang a carol. As we were sitting down I felt some one poke my shoulder.

'Your mother says you must put on your jacket. She says you'll take cold,' whispered the little girl behind me.

I had not felt cold, but the command pa.s.sed along over two church pews had the force of a Thus-saith-the-Lord. While I was slipping the jacket carefully over my ruffles, some one poked Luella and whispered to her.

Luella looked at me, then put on her jacket.

The superintendent was making a speech to the Fathers-and-Mothers-and-Friends-of-the-School. When he finished, we rose to sing another carol, and as we rose, quite automatically Luella and I slipped off our jackets. I was very excited. After the carol there would be a piece by one of the Big Girls; then the Infant Cla.s.s would do something; then I was to speak. I wondered if people would see the pink of my slip showing through my dress as I spoke my piece. I bent my head to get a whiff of carnation.

We were just seated when there came another poke and another whisper.

'Your mother says to keep on your jacket.

I looked back at my mother. She smiled and nodded, and Aunt Emma pointed to Luella. We put on our jackets again. This time I b.u.t.toned it tight; so did Luella. I felt the carnations remonstrate, but when one is very excited one is very obedient: one obeys more than the letter of the law.

The Big Girl was speaking her piece. I didn't hear the words; the words of my own piece were saying themselves through my head; but I was aware that she stopped suddenly, that she looked as though she were trying to remember, that someone prompted her, that she went on. Suppose I should forget that way, before my father and mother and the friends of the school and Miss Miriam! It was a dreadful thought. I commenced again,--with my eyes shut,--

'Some children think that Christmas day Should come two times a year.'

I went through my verses five times, while the Infant Cla.s.s individually and collectively were holding up gilt cardboard bells and singing about them. I was beginning the sixth time,--

'Some children think,--'

when the superintendent read out,--

'The next number on the programme will be a recitation by Martha Smith.'

I had been expecting this announcement for four weeks, but now that it came, it gave me a queer feeling in my heart and stomach, half-fear, half-joy. Conscious only that I was actually taking part, I rose from my seat and made my way over the little girls in the pew, who scrunched up themselves and their dresses into a small s.p.a.ce so that I might pa.s.s.

As I started down the aisle I thought I heard my name frantically called behind me; but not dreaming that any one would wish to have speech with a person about to speak a piece, I kept on down, way, way down to the platform, walking in a dim hot maze which smelled insistently of carnations.

But the poor carnations warned in vain. I ascended the platform steps with my reefer still b.u.t.toned tightly over my chest.

The reefer, as I have said, was dark blue, adorned with tarnished anchors, and outgrown. Being outgrown, it showed several inches of my thin little wrists, and being a reefer and tightly b.u.t.toned, it showed of my pink and white glory a little more than the hem.

Still in that dim hot maze, I made my bow and gave the t.i.tle of my piece, 'Christmas Twice a Year,' and recited it from beginning to end, and heard them clap, all the teachers and scholars and Fathers-and-Mothers-and-Friends-of-the-School. Then, quite dizzied with happiness, I hurried down off the platform and up the aisle. People smiled as I pa.s.sed them and I smiled back, for once quite unconscious of my jaw. As I neared my seat I prepared to smile upon my mother, but for a moment she didn't see me. Aunt Emma was saying something to her, something that I didn't hear, something that made two red spots flame in my mother's face.

'Isn't it just like Martha to be a little fool! She's always doing things like that.'

Aunt Emma was one of those people who a.s.sume that you always do the particular foolish thing you have just finished doing.

The red spots died out when my mother saw me. She smiled as though she were very proud--and I was proud too. But before I could settle down to enjoy my satisfaction, Luella's name had been called and Luella was starting down the aisle. Luella's golden curls bobbed as she walked: they bobbed over her blue reefer jacket which was b.u.t.toned snugly over her plump body.

There was a suppressed exclamation from some one behind me, but Luella kept on. Luella's jacket was not short in the sleeves, but it was very very tight. Only the hem of her blue and white glory peeped from beneath it, and a little piece of ruffle she had not quite tucked in peeped out from above it.

Luella bowed and spoke her piece. All the teachers and scholars, all the Fathers-and-Mothers-and-Friends-of-the-School applauded.

A queer sound made me look round at my mother and aunt. Their heads were bowed upon the pew in front. Their shoulders were shaking. When I turned around again they were sitting up, wiping their eyes as if they had been crying.