"Oh, I'm quite patient _sometimes_."

"Well, look here-I'll wait and see, then. But I'll tell you one thing-if things don't begin to get different pretty soon, I'm off!"

"All right," said Jane, getting up. Paul stood up, too. Then suddenly he held out his hand.

"Listen, Janey-please don't mind me when I get rough and short. You've got more sense than I have, and I need someone to talk to like the d.i.c.kens."

"_I've_ got more sense than _you_ have, Paul!" repeated Jane, sincerely amazed. "How can you say that? Why, you're the most-the most clever person I ever knew in my life!"

Nothing cements friendship like mutual admiration; but Jane felt something warmer and better than mere admiration, as she put her hand into Paul's big paw; she felt that rare, happy pleasure that is stirred in a responsive young soul when it is first called upon to give sympathy and help; and their firm handclasp sealed a friendship that was to last to the end of their lives.

CHAPTER VII-GIRLS

Half a dozen feminine tongues babbled cheerfully. For once the Deacon's chilly parlor, with its slippery, horse-hair furniture, its stiff-featured portraits, and its big, black square piano, had lost a little of its funereal aspect, and a great deal of its oppressive neatness. Over the chairs, over the Brussels carpet, over the bow-legged table were scattered pieces of bright sateen, blue, red, orange and black, sc.r.a.ps of lace and gold tinsel, spangles and feathers. A coal fire glowed amiably in the grate, adding a deeper color to six blooming faces, and flashing on the bright needles that were so industriously plied. Outside, the first heavy snow of the winter was falling, in big, lazy flakes, which had already covered streets and roofs, and weighted the twigs and branches of the trees.

"Well, I've got every one of my Christmas presents ready," remarked one young lady with a comfortable sigh of relief. "I start making them in June, but somehow I never get done until the _last_ minute."

"I just never try to make mine," said another, "I take a day, and buy all of them in the city, when I go to visit Cousin Mary. It saves time and trouble, and _I_ think it's really more economical."

"Oh, but then they don't have the personal touch," said a third, a tall, thin anaemic-looking girl, with large, soulful eyes, and a tiny mouth.

"And that is what counts. It's what makes Christmas presents mean something. I always say that I never think of the gift, but of the thought of the giver."

"But you make such clever things, Amelia," said the one who bought her Christmas presents, feeling ashamed of her lack of sentiment.

"Very simple things, Dolly," said Amelia, rinsing off her watercolor brush, and then dabbing it in a square of holly-red paint. "But I think that just a little card, with a tasteful design, and an appropriate verse is a very suitable way of expressing the spirit of Christmas."

"And quite right, my dear," boomed in Mrs. Deacon, appearing in the doorway. "But then you have such a charming gift of poesy. Not all of us are blessed with _your_ magniloquence." She lifted one of Amelia's cards, and inspected it, through a pair of lorgnettes, which she held about six inches from her eyes, spreading out her little finger. "_How_ charming! How effete with taste! Lily, my dear, you too should try to emulate Amelia's Christmastide mementos. You are not entirely devoid of poetic genius. Why, I have many little emblems of your youthful flights of fancy-where is that alb.u.m, my dear?"

"Oh, mamma!" cried Lily, blushing crimson. "Those silly poems of mine!"

"Indeed they are not silly," said Mrs. Deacon, rummaging in the drawer of the table. "No, the alb.u.m is not here. Lily, my dear, when will you remember that everything has its proper place? Now, I did want to read Amelia that delightful little Bandeau of yours on the Pine-Tree. She would be interested, I'm sure. And the Alb.u.m is not here. Perhaps though, I put it away myself."

"Oh, mamma, don't get it now," begged Lily, overcome with embarra.s.sment, adding, desperately, "Do look at the lovely thing Elise is making."

Mrs. Deacon, huge and majestic in her rustling black silk, turned her lorgnette on Elise's exquisite embroidery.

"Charming. Absolutely charming. Do not rise, my dear. Well, I see that you are all happily occupied. What are these gay colors?" she asked presently, indicating the pieces of sateen.

"Oh, I brought some things that I thought might do for costumes, Mrs.

Deacon," said Annie Lee Webster. "For our party you know, on New Year's Eve."

"Ah! A Masquerade? How charming."

"What are you going as, Amelia?" asked the fourth girl, the lively, apple-cheeked Dolly Webster. The poetess looked up dreamily.

"As Sappho," she replied. Mrs. Deacon looked astonished, and interested.

"Sappho, my dear? How will you do that? Sappho was a race-horse!"

There was an irrepressible chuckle from the window embrasure, where, concealed by the long, dark-red curtains, Jane was curled, with a book, and a half-sucked orange.

Mrs. Deacon turned swiftly, her lorgnette levelled on the younger Miss Lambert like a microscope.

"Ah, Jane!" she observed a little coldly. Jane stood up respectfully, concealing her vulgar orange under her pinafore. "What are you laughing at, my dear?" asked Mrs. Deacon suspiciously.

"I thought it would be funny for Amelia to go as a race-horse," replied Jane, simply, quite at her ease under Mrs. Deacon's prolonged stare.

Amelia, who took herself very seriously, and hated to appear in a ridiculous light even for a moment, said rather indignantly,

"A race-horse! Sappho was a poetess."

"Ah, of course!" said Mrs. Deacon hastily, "that will be charming. And _so_ well chosen. How will you signify yourself?"

"I am going to wear a simple Grecian robe of white muslin, with laurel leaves in my hair. And I shall carry a lyre," replied Amelia. "I thought I would let my hair hang loose."

"Ravishing! Simply ravishing!" cried Mrs. Deacon in perfect raptures.

"So simple. And after all, is there anything like simplicity?"

"How will you get a lyre?" asked the practical Annie Lee.

"I shall try to make one out of card-board and gold paper."

"Or you could borrow old Mr. Poindexter's banjo," suggested Jane, gravely. "That would really be better, because you _could_ tw.a.n.g on it."

Amelia did not deign to reply to this remark.

"What are you going to wear, Lily?" Elise put in hurriedly, throwing a reproving look at Jane.

Lily glanced at her mother.

"I wish I could go as-as a Spanish dancer!" she said timidly.

"A Spanish dancer, Lily!" cried Mrs. Deacon. "Indeed I could not permit anything of the sort! No. But it seems to me that it would be very delightful if you should affect a character very similar to Amelia's.

Why would it not be sweet for you to go together as the Two Muses, the one fair, the other brunette, representing, as it were, the poetical talent of Frederickstown? I would suggest, too, that each of you recite some little poem of her own composition. Lily, I must find that alb.u.m."

And with this, Mrs. Deacon hastened from the room.

Lily looked distressed. She was terribly shy, and the thought of having her poor little verses publicly read and appraised, dyed her smooth face, with one of her frequent blushes.

"I _would_ like to go as a Spanish Dancer, though," she said, presently, biting off a thread with her little white teeth, "I don't know why, but I do. I'd like to wear a comb in my hair, and a black fan, and _scarlet heels_!"

"You'd look lovely. I'm sure if you beg hard, your mother would let you," wheedled Annie Lee. Lily shook her head.

"I don't think so. And I'm afraid mamma thinks its awfully bold of me even to think of such a thing."

"There's nothing bold about a Spanish dancer. Just dashing," said Dolly.