"I don't believe that I should be so ready to disobey mamma," Belle would say to Brenda when the latter on occasions remonstrated with her, "but with grandmamma it is different, for I do not consider that she has any right to lay down the law as she does."

Nevertheless when Brenda and Belle sat in the front row in the large Music Hall--for Brenda had bought expensive seats--both girls felt that old Mrs. Gregg was pretty nearly right in saying that places of amus.e.m.e.nt were not proper for a young girl. They had both been at similar performances before, but always some older person had selected the entertainment. This one, which they themselves had chosen from the glaring posters decorating the bill-boards of the city, and from the conversation of the Harvard freshman of their acquaintance was altogether different from anything that they had seen. It was advertised as an exhibition of ventriloquists, but it had a general air of vulgarity that was extremely displeasing to them. Brenda wished more than once that she had not joined Belle in this adventure. She did not like the loud jokes, and the scant costumes of the performers, and she hoped that there was no one in the audience who would recognize her. Of course there were times when she laughed at the funny things on the stage--for who could help it--but many of the jokes and the incidents at which the rest of the audience laughed the loudest fell rather flat on the ears of the two young girls. This was as it should be, for neither of the two was anything worse than heedless and a little too fond of having her own way. In Belle this wilfulness took the form of a willingness to use subterfuge, both in word or deed to gain her own way.

Brenda did not follow her very closely in this direction, although there was danger that her conscience would be dulled, before she realized it, under Belle's influence. Brenda indeed felt so uncomfortable during the performance, that if she could have done so without observation, she would have left the hall. But she did not quite dare to go out in the face of the great audience, and besides when she made the suggestion to Belle, the latter would not hear of her going. "No, indeed," she had said, "why should we go. You are a regular baby, Brenda; it isn't so very bad, only a little vulgar, and just see what crowds of people there are here, and some of them seem just as good as we are, and you know I read you that newspaper clipping that said that this was one of the successes of the year. You and I are not used to this kind of thing, but dear me! we can't expect to stay children all our lives." So Brenda sat there with an uneasy conscience, wondering what her mother would say, or her father--or Julia who never by any chance did anything that she ought not to do.

Stolen sweets are apt to taste a little bitter, and when the performance was over, Brenda and Belle went out with the crowd. On the way out rough people, or people whom Belle called "rough," pushed against them, while one or two rude boys made saucy remarks to the young girls who seemed conscious of being in the wrong place. It wasn't at all an agreeable experience, especially as they were both wondering if any of their friends were likely to see them.

Then there was that chance glimpse of Julia and Miss South, and the rather silly action on the part of Brenda and Belle of hiding in the doorway. Really they needed all the consolation they could get from their visit to the confectioner's around the corner. There they drank great gla.s.ses of chocolate, sipping the whipped cream at the top, as if they were young ladies of twenty loitering in the shops after the symphony. As they stirred the chocolate with their long spoons, and lingered on the settee at the end of the shop to watch the lively young men and women who were constantly coming in and out to buy bonbons, or to get refreshment, they forgot all that had been disagreeable at the music hall, and for the time being imagined that they were young ladies themselves. Yet when Brenda reached home with hardly time to dress for dinner, conscience began to p.r.i.c.k again.

XXIII

ALMOST READY

Now however slowly time appears to pa.s.s, the end of any period of waiting is sure to come, and its last days or hours generally seem to melt away. Thus, when The Four realized that less than two weeks lay between a certain April afternoon when they met to sew, and the day appointed for the opening of the Bazaar, they began to feel a little nervous. "I wish that we hadn't set any particular day," exclaimed Brenda, "we might just have waited until we were all ready, and then we----"

"Oh, Brenda, how unpractical you are," cried Edith, "that would have been perfectly ridiculous. You know that we have to advertise a little, and engage music and people to help us, and make all kinds of arrangements."

"Oh, I dare say," responded the unpractical Brenda, "but still it takes all the fun out of it to think that we must be ready by a particular day; I feel exactly as if some one were driving me on, and you know that is not pleasant."

"Oh, nonsense," interposed Nora, with a smile. "Just think how long we were working without any special object. I am sure that we had all the time we wished, and we had hardly a thing to show for it. For my own part I shall be awfully glad to have the Bazaar over with. The weather is altogether too fine to waste indoors on fancy work, but until we have that money for Manuel I suppose that none of us will feel free to do as she likes in the afternoons. There are so many things to attend to that I don't see how we are ever to get ready even in two weeks."

Now the plans for the Bazaar had received much attention from the older persons in the families of the young workers, and the encouragement that they had had from their elders was now their chief incentive. Edith's mother had offered them the use of a large drawing-room in her house which was just adapted to an affair of this kind. It was a long room with hard wood floor, intended really for dancing. Its walls, paneled with mirrors, would reflect the tables of fancy work in such a way, as to make it seem "as if we had twice as much as we really have," said Brenda. As to other things there was a great deal to be decided. Brenda and Belle wished a small orchestra engaged to play during the evening of the Bazaar, and furnish music for dancing at the close of the sale.

Edith and Nora were afraid that this would eat up too much of their profits, but Brenda was very decided in her views. "You can't expect that we are not to have any fun out of it ourselves, after all the trouble we've had, and I know that there is going to be plenty of money for the Rosas. We shall make lots out of the flower table; we have quant.i.ties of plants and cut flowers promised us from the greenhouses of our friends--just quant.i.ties, and then the refreshment table, and--well you know yourselves that we shall have more than we can sell."

"What good will that do?" enquired the practical Nora. "We can't make much out of things that we can't sell."

"Oh, I mean sell in the regular way; of course we'll have an auction, and get ever so much in that way. I shouldn't wonder if we should have more than $500 to give to Mrs. Rosa."

"Don't count your chickens too soon, Brenda," said Belle; "suppose it should rain on the day of the sale, or suppose,----"

"Oh, how tiresome you are!" cried the sanguine Brenda, "you are just as bad as the others, and it's quite as much your Bazaar as mine, and if it doesn't succeed, you'll be just as much to blame."

The fretful note in Brenda's voice warned her friends that she was taking things too deeply to heart.

"Why, Brenda, no one is probably going to be to blame, for the Bazaar will be a great success," interposed the peace-loving Edith. "All we have to do now is to try our very best to make it go off as well as possible."

Now the Bazaar was to be the Wednesday of the week following Easter, and this year Easter fell almost in the middle of April. During the last days of school preceding the Easter vacation the four did much canva.s.sing among their friends to see whether all the articles promised were finished. Of course there were several disappointments. Some girls who had promised special things either had not finished them or had forgotten all about them. On the other hand, there were some who had not only done much more than they had promised themselves, but had collected many pretty, and even valuable articles from their friends. All the school girls near the age of the four were invited to a.s.sist at the tables. The four resolved themselves into an executive committee, adding to their number Julia, and Frances and one or two others. Each of these girls was to have special charge of a table or department, and she in turn was to call on others to a.s.sist her.

Julia had invited Ruth Roberts as her chief a.s.sistant, rather to the distaste of Frances, who thought that this was going too far out of their set.

"What do we know about Ruth Roberts?" she had said in a contemptuous way; "n.o.body ever heard of her, I am sure, until she came here to school."

"We have nothing to do with that," replied Nora, to whom the remark happened to be made. "I dare say that there are a great many good people in the world of whom we have never heard; I know all that I need to about Ruth Roberts, that she has good manners and a pleasant disposition, and an agreeable family. I know, for I have visited them----" Then, throwing a little emphasis into her voice, she concluded, "Really, Frances, you are growing very tiresome, and if I were you I should try to be less narrow-minded. Any one to hear you talk, would think that no one in the world is worth considering who does not happen to live in certain streets in your neighborhood."

"Perhaps that is what I do think," answered Frances. "We can't make intimate friends of every one in the world, and we might as well have nothing to do with those who are not in our own set. I hate these people who are always trying to push in."

"If you mean Ruth, you are entirely wrong. She is the last girl in the world likely to try to push in. She thinks quite as well of herself as you do of yourself, and I dare say that she had some ancestors, even if they were not governors of Ma.s.sachusetts."

Now despite the fact that this speech, when quoted, sounds rather acrimonious, Frances took no offence at it. She could not afford to quarrel with so popular a girl as Nora, and besides she knew that the Gostars had a good claim to the same kind of pride of descent that she had herself. So, although both girls turned away from each other with an annoyed expression on their faces, their next meeting was perfectly amicable.

When Nora repeated this conversation to her mother, Mrs. Gostar smiled.

"If I were you, Nora, I would not take anything that Frances says too seriously. She has been brought up rather unfortunately."

"But it is so tiresome to have her going around most of the time with her head in the air, saying, 'Oh, I cannot do this, or I cannot do that, because I am a Pounder.'"

Mrs. Gostar laughed at this speech, and the gesture and tossing back of the head with which Nora emphasized it.

"Frances hardly says that, does she?" she enquired.

"Yes, she does, she really does--sometimes," replied Nora, "and I am sure that she feels like saying it all the time. Of course we all know that there have been two governors, and one or two generals, and other people like that in her family somewhere in the dim past. I am sure that we have heard enough about it. But there is nothing very great about Frances' own family so far as I have ever heard, and some one told me that her father could not even get his degree at college. If they hadn't so much money----"

"There, there," interrupted her mother, "aren't you growing uncharitable yourself? It is really true that Frances had ancestors who were of great service to the country, and her family has had position for a long time, and all the advantages of education. But among your schoolmates and hers there are probably other girls of good descent, who have had advantages hardly inferior to those that Frances has enjoyed. They may have names that are not so well known, and yet their ancestors may have been almost as useful in building up this country as those of Frances."

"Well," said Nora, "I don't value people for their ancestors, but for what they are themselves."

"That is the right spirit, and yet neither you nor I should blame Frances for having pride in what her ancestors have done. It is well to remember such things, if remembering them makes one more ambitious or more helpful to those around him. But when this pride in his own people leads one to belittle all others whose part in making history may have been almost as important, if less conspicuous--then I would rather see a girl or a boy without family pride. In connection with this, let me tell you a story. Years ago a murder was committed by a member of a good, old family, and sometime afterwards a lady who bore the same name, though she was not closely related to the murderer, was out shopping. It seemed to her a certain clerk was not sufficiently deferential, and so to reprove him, she said, in a rather haughty tone, 'Perhaps you do not know who I am.' 'No, madame, I do not,' was his reply. 'I am a _Blenkinsop_,' she responded, thinking probably that this would overwhelm him. 'Indeed,' he answered, 'you surprise me. I thought that all the Blenkinsops had been hanged.' So you see that it does not always do to boast of one's family name. Of course this does not apply to Frances, and I should be sorry if either she or you should forget all the good things which her ancestors did for the commonwealth. Yet it would be a great deal better to forget it than to have the remembrance of the distinction of your ancestors so elate you as to make you contemptuous of your schoolmates."

"I know that, mother dear," replied Nora, "and I believe that some day I may be able to have a little talk with Frances, and perhaps I can get her to see things as I do."

"You might tell her," responded Mrs. Gostar, with a smile, "about the Virginia lady of whom I was reading the other day. Her little niece was remarking with pride that her grandfather had been the son of a baronet, and that in consequence she had a right to feel superior to many of her neighbors. 'Yes,' responded the aunt, 'he was the son of a baronet, who was the son of a manufacturer, who was the son of an apothecary's apprentice.' 'Oh, dear,' sighed the niece, 'is it really true? Am I descended from an apothecary's apprentice? I thought that all my ancestors were gentlemen.'

"'I haven't finished,' returned the aunt. 'The apprentice was the grandson of a baronet, who in turn was said to trace his descent from a king of England.' The aunt smiled at the expression of relief on her niece's face on hearing this, as she said, 'I always knew that we were of good family.' My own moral," concluded Mrs. Gostar, "would be the same as that which the aunt tried to impress on her niece. We all can trace our descent through a variety of families, and while we can often find ancestors to boast of, as often we find others who are what Frances might call 'very plain people.'"

Nora realized that she was fortunate in having a mother who was always ready to advise her in the small matters that seem so important to schoolgirls, as well as in those larger things that really are of consequence. Without encouraging anything approaching gossip or tale-bearing Mrs. Gostar always permitted Nora to talk very freely on all the subjects that interested her, and the confidence between mother and daughter was almost ideal. Mrs. Blair and Mrs. Barlow were also ready to advise their daughters, although they both were a little more occupied with society than Mrs. Gostar and had less time at home. The wilful Brenda, too, was more apt to seek her mother's advice after she had done a certain thing than to ask it in advance. Yet although her doings were sometimes a little annoying to others, she always admitted to herself that she could depend on her mother's sympathy. Edith, with a rather phlegmatic disposition, seldom did anything wrong. She had been brought up rather strictly in accordance with prescribed rules, and she was always confident that whatever her mother had arranged or advised was exactly right. Belle alone, of the Four, was unfortunate in her home surroundings. Her mother, a nervous invalid, had permitted Belle's grandmother to rule the household with a rod of iron, and knowing that the old lady was often unjust the former did not reprove Belle sufficiently when she broke some of her grandmother's rules. Belle in this way came to be a law to herself. She obeyed her grandmother when there was no escape for it, but oftener she took the chance of disregarding her authority, saying to herself,--or even to others--"If mamma could do as she liked, she would let me do this." It was not always a legitimate excuse, although the conditions in her family enabled many of her acquaintances to make excuses for Belle.

As to Frances, those who knew her best, realized that her family pride had been nurtured at home, and that her unfortunate way of looking at things was not wholly her own fault.

Yet that Nora had been able to influence her somewhat was proved by a slight change in Frances' demeanor towards others. The latter was even known one day to offer to go out to Ruth Roberts' house to help her finish a piece of work for the Bazaar. In those last days, too, before the Easter vacation there seemed to be an unusual unity among the schoolgirls. Even those in the older cla.s.ses, who seldom interested themselves in the "small fry," as they called the Four and their contemporaries, came forward with many contributions for the Bazaar.

"Dear me!" moaned Brenda one day, "I am afraid that we won't have people enough to sell all these things to, and a while ago I was afraid that we shouldn't have things enough to sell to all those who might come to our Bazaar."

"That shows," said Miss South, who had come up behind Brenda while she was talking, "that it is never worth while to borrow trouble about anything."

"That is true," interposed the placid Edith, to whom Brenda had been talking. "For my own part, I am never surprised or disappointed about anything, for I never expect too much beforehand. I find that I can always put up with things when they come."

"Then you are really a philosopher, Edith," said Miss South, "some persons take almost a lifetime to learn this simple lesson, and indeed some persons never learn it at all."

As the preparations for the Bazaar advanced it was very pleasant for Julia to find herself counted in among the band of workers.

It is true that she often had to take a sharp word from Brenda, or a cold glance from Belle, but these things did not disturb her.

She had become accustomed to her cousin's little ways, and she realized that her "bark was worse than her bite," as Nora was in the habit of saying.

There was one thing about which Brenda was very decided, and that was that no older person, that is no parent or teacher, was to have any part in managing the Bazaar.