Patty turned a flushed face to her cousin, and looked dazed and bewildered.

"Two and five-eighths ounces of sugar," she said, "spun to a thread; add chopped nuts and the well-beaten whites of six eggs; brown with a salamander. Marian, I haven't any salamander!"

The tragic tone of Patty's awful avowal was too much for Marian, and she dropped into a kitchen chair and went off into peals of laughter.

"Patty," she cried, "you goose! What are you doing? Just making up the whole recipe-book, page by page? I believe you're crazy!"

"It's for the Tea Club," exclaimed Patty, "and I want things to be nice."

"H'm," said Marian, "and _are_ they nice?"

She glanced at some of the completed delicacies on the table, and Patty, seeing the look, turned red again, but this time it was not the effect of the kitchen range.

"Well," she said, "some of them aren't quite right, but I think the others will be."

"And I think you're working too hard," said Marian kindly. "You come away with me now, and rest a little bit; and, Mancy, you put a little lunch for us on the dining-room table, won't you? Just anything will do, you know."

CHAPTER XII

A TEA CLUB TEA

Patty rebelled at being overruled in this manner, but Marian had some Fairfield firmness of her own, and taking her cousin's arm led her to the library and plumped her down upon the couch in a reclining position, while she vigorously jammed pillows under her head.

"There, miss," she announced, "you will please stay there until luncheon is announced."

"But, Marian," pleaded Patty, seeing that resistance was useless, "I've such a lot of things to do, and the girls will be here before I get them all done."

"Let them come," said the hard-hearted Marian, "it won't hurt them a bit, and you've got enough things done now to feed the Russian army."

"But they're not finished," said Patty, "and they'll spoil standing."

"You'll more likely spoil them by finishing them. Now you stay right where you are."

So Patty rested, until Pansy came and called them to a most appetising little lunch spread very simply on the dining-table.

The two hungry girls did full justice to it, and then Patty said:

"Now, Marian, you're a duck, and you mean well, I know; but this is my house and my tea-party, and now you must clear out and leave me to fix it up pretty in my own way."

"All right," said Marian, "I rescued you once, now this time I'll leave you to your fate; but I'll give you fair warning that those Tea Club girls would rather have a few nice little things like we had at lunch, than all those ridiculous contraptions that you've got out there half baked."

"Oh me, oh me!" sighed Patty, in mock despair. "n.o.body appreciates me; n.o.body realises or cares for my one great talent. I believe I'll go and drown myself."

"Do," said Marian, "drown yourself in that tub of wine-jelly, for it will never stiffen. I can tell that by looking at it."

"Bye, bye," said Patty, pushing Marian out of the dining-room, "run along now, and take a little nap like a good little girl. Cousin Patty must set the table all nice for the pretty ladies."

"Goose!" was the only comment Marian vouchsafed as she walked away.

Then Patty, with the a.s.sistance of Pansy Potts, proceeded to lay the table. Elaborate decoration was her keynote and she kept well in tune.

Along the centre of the table over the damask cloth, she spread a rich lace "runner" and over this, crossed bands of wide, pink, satin ribbon ran the entire diagonal length of the table. In the centre was a large cut-gla.s.s bowl of pink roses, and at each corner slender vases of a single rose in each. Also single roses with long stems and leaves were laid at intervals on the cloth. Asparagus fern was lavishly used, and pink-shaded candles in silver candlesticks adorned the table. Small silver dishes of almonds, olives, and confectionery were dotted about, and finger-bowls with plates were set out on the side-table.

Certainly it was all very beautiful, and Patty surveyed it with feelings of absolute satisfaction.

"We will have tea at five o'clock, Pansy," she said, "and just before that, you light the candles and fill the gla.s.ses and see that everything is ready."

"Yes, Miss Patty," said Pansy, who adored her young mistress, and who was especially quick in learning to do exactly what was expected of her.

The afternoon was slipping away, and Patty suddenly discovered that she had only time to get dressed before the girls would arrive.

So she announced to Mancy that she must finish up such things as were not finished, and without waiting to hear the old woman's remarks of disapproval, Patty ran up to her room.

There she found that Marian had kindly laid out her dress and ribbons for her, and was ready to help do her hair.

"You're a good old thing, Marian," she said, as she dropped into a chair in front of her toilet mirror, "I'm as tired as a bicycle wheel, and besides, I do love to have somebody do my hair. Sometimes Pansy does it, but to-day she's too busy."

"Taking days as they go," said Marian in an impersonal manner, "I don't think I ever saw a more busy one than to-day has seemed to be. The Tea Club does seem to make a most awful amount of fl.u.s.ter in a new house."

"Yes, it _is_ exacting, isn't it?" said Patty, who caught her cousin's eye in the mirror and looked very demure, though she refused to smile.

"There are some of the girls coming in at the front gate now," said Marian as she tied the big white bow on Patty's pretty, fluffy hair.

"Didn't I time this performance just right?"

"You did indeed," said Patty, and kissing her cousin, she ran gaily downstairs.

How the Tea Club girls did chatter that afternoon! there was so much to see and talk about in Patty's new home, and there were also other weighty matters to be discussed.

The proposed entertainment was an engrossing subject, and as various opinions were held, the arguments were lively and outspoken.

"You can talk all you like," said Helen Preston, "but you'll find that a bazaar will be the most sensible thing after all. You're sure to make a lot of money, and the boys will help, and we all know exactly what to do and how to go about it."

"It may be sensible," said Laura Russell, "but it won't be a bit of fun.

Stupid, poky, old chestnut; n.o.body wants to come to buy things, they only come because they think they have to. Now if we had a play--"

"Yes," said Elsie Morris, "a play would be the very nicest thing. I've brought two books for us to look over. One's that Shakespeare thing, and the other is called 'A Reunion at Mother Goose's.' It's awfully funny; I think it's better than the Shakespeare."

"I think Mother Goose things are silly," said Ethel Holmes. "Who wants to go around dressed up like Little Bo-peep, and say 'Ba, ba, black sheep,'

all the time?"

"Yes, or who wants to be Red Riding Hood's wolf and eat up Mary's little lamb?"

"Oh, it isn't like that; it's a reunion, you know, and all the Mother Goose children are grown up, and they talk about old times."

"It does sound nice," said Patty, "let's read it."