"Never mind, Buddy; we won't get left, as you call it, this time, anyway--unless, of course, Momsy vetoes it."

"Vetoes what, children?"

They had been so noisy that they had not heard their mother's step on the creaking stairs.

Mrs. Frey carried her pencil and notes, and she looked tired, but she smiled indulgently as she repeated, "What am I to veto, dearies--or to approve?"

"It's a sequet! A Trismas sequet!"

"Yes, an' it's got ow.a.n.ges in it--"

"--An' bananas!"

"Hush, you ponies! And, Dolly, not another word!" Meg had resolutely taken the floor again.

"Momsy, we've been consulting about our Christmas money, and we've voted to ask you to let us do something with it, and not to tell you a thing about it, only "--and here she glanced for approval at Ethel and Conrad--"only we _ought_ to tell you, Momsy, dear, that the surprise isn't for you this time."

And then Mrs. Frey, sweet mother that she was, made just the little speech they thought she would make, and when they had kissed her, and all, even to Ethel, who seemed now as enthusiastic as the others, caught hands and danced around the dinner table, she was glad she had consented.

It was such a delight to be able to supplement their scant Christmas prospects with an indulgence giving such pleasure.

"And I'm glad it isn't for me, children," she added, as soon as the hubbub gave her a hearing. "I'm very glad. You know you strained a point last year, and I'm sure you did right. My little stove has been a great comfort. But I am always certain of just as many home-made presents as I have children, and they are the ones I value. Dolly's lamp-lighters are not all used up yet, and if she _were_ to give me another bundle this Christmas I shouldn't feel sorry. But our little Christmas _money_ we want to send out on some loving mission. And, by-the-way, I have two dollars which may go with yours if you need it--if it will make some poor body's bed softer or his dinner better."

"Momsy's guessed!" Felix clapped his hands with delight.

"'Sh! Hush, Felix! Yes, Momsy, it 'll do one of those things exactly,"

said Meg. "And now _I_ say we'd better break up this meeting before the ponies tell the whole business."

"F'lix never telled a thing," chirped Felicie, always ready to defend her mate. "Did you, F'lixy? Momsy said 'dinner' herself."

"So I did, dear; but who is to get the dinner and why you are going to send it are things mother doesn't wish to know. And here are my two dollars. Now off to bed, the whole trundle-bed crowd, for I have a lot of copy to write to-night. Ethel may bring me a bite, and then sit beside me and write while I sip my tea and dictate and Meg puts the chickens to roost. And Conrad will keep quiet over his books. Just one kiss apiece and a hug for Dolly. Shoo now!"

So the party was decided.

The Frey home, although one of the poorest, was one of the happiest in New Orleans, for it was made up of cheery workers, even little Dorothea having her daily self-a.s.sumed tasks. Miss Dorothea, if you please, dusted the banisters round the porch every day, straightened the rows of shoes in mother's closet, folded the daily papers in the rack, and kept the one rug quite even with the front of the hearth. And this young lady had, furthermore, her regular income of five cents a week.

Of course her one nickel contributed to the party had been saved only a few hours, but Dorothea was only five, and the old yellow _praline_ woman knew about her income, and came trudging all the way up the stairs each week on "pay-day."

Even after the invitations were sent it seemed to Dolly that the "party-day" would never come, for there were to be "three sleeps" before it should arrive.

It was Ethel's idea to send the cards early, so as to forestall any home preparation among the guests.

But all things come to him who waits--even Christmas. And so at last the great day arrived.

Nearly all the invited had accepted, and everything was very exciting; but the situation was not without its difficulties.

Even though she was out every day, it had been so hard to keep every tell-tale preparation out of Mrs. Frey's sight. But when she had found a pan of crullers on the top pantry shelf, or heard the m.u.f.fled "gobble-gobble" of the turkey shut up in the old flour-barrel, or smelt invisible bananas and apples, she had been truly none the wiser, but had only said, "Bless their generous hearts! They are getting up a fine dinner to send to somebody."

Indeed, Mrs. Frey never got an inkling of the whole truth until she tripped up the stairs a half-hour before dinner on Christmas day to find the feast all spread.

The old mahogany table, extended to its full length, stood gorgeous in decorations of palmetto, moss, and flowers out upon the deep back porch, which was converted into a very pretty chamber by the hanging curtain of gray.

If she had any misgivings about it, she betrayed them by no single word or look, but there were bright red spots upon her usually pale cheeks as she pa.s.sed, smiling, into her room to dash into the dinner dress Ethel had laid out for her.

To have her poverty-stricken home invaded by a host of strangers was striking a blow at the most sensitive weakness of this proud woman. And yet the loving motive which was so plain through it all, showing the very spirit in her dear children for which she had prayed, was too sacred a thing to be chilled by even a half-shade of disapproval.

"And who are coming, dear?" she asked of Meg, as soon as she could trust her voice.

"All the roomers, Momsy, excepting the little hunchback lady and Madame Coraline."

"Madame Coraline!" Mrs. Frey could not help exclaiming.

"Yes, Momsy. She accepted, and she _even came_, but she went back just now. She was dressed terribly fine--gold lace and green silk, but it was old and dowdy; and, Momsy, her cheeks were just as red! I was on the stepladder tackin' up the Bethlehem picture, Sisty was standin' on the high-chair hanging up the star, and Buddy's arms were full of gray moss that he was wrappin' round your chair. But we were just as polite to her as we could be, and asked her to take a seat. And we all thought she sat down; but she went, Momsy, and no one saw her go. Buddy says she's a witch. She left that flower-pot of sweet-basil on the table. I s'pose she brought it for a present. Do you think that we'd better send for her to come back, Momsy?"

"No, daughter, I think not. No doubt she had her own reasons for going, and she may come back. And are the rest all coming?"

"Yes'm; but we had a time gettin' Miss Guyosa to come. She says she's a First Family, an' she never mixes. But I told her so were we, and we mixed. And then I said that if she'd come she could sit at one end o'

the table and carve the ham, while you'd do the turkey. But she says Buddy ought to do the turkey. But she's comin'. And, Momsy, the turkey is a perfect beauty. We put pecans in him. Miss Guyosa gave us the receipt and the nuts, too. Her cousin sent 'em to her from his plantation. And did you notice the paper roses in the moss festoons, Momsy? She made those. She has helped us fix up _a lot_. She made all the Easter flowers on St. Joseph's altar at the Cathedral, too, and--"

A rap at the door announcing a first guest sent the little cook bounding to the kitchen, while Ethel rushed into her mother's room, her mouth full of pins and her sash on her arm.

She had dressed the three little ones a half-hour ago; and Conrad, who had also made an early toilet, declared that they had all three walked round the dinner table thirty-nine times since their appearance in the "dining-room." When he advanced to do the honors, the small procession toddling single file behind him, somehow it had not occurred to him that he might encounter Miss Penny, the canary lady, standing in a dainty old dress of yellow silk just outside the door, nor, worse still, that she should bear in her hands a tiny cage containing a pair of young canaries.

He said afterwards that "everything would have pa.s.sed off all right if it hadn't been for the twins." Of course he had forgotten that he had himself been the first one to compare Miss Penny to a canary.

By the time the little black-eyed woman had flitted into the door, and in a chirpy, bird-like voice wished them a merry Christmas, Felix had stuffed his entire handkerchief into his mouth. Was it any wonder that Felicie and Dorothea, seeing this, did actually disgrace the whole party by convulsions of laughter?

They were soon restored to order, though, by the little yellow-gowned lady herself, for it took but half a minute to say that the birds were a present for the twins--"the two little ones who brought me the invitation."

Such a present as this is no laughing matter, and, besides, the little Frey children were at heart polite. And so they had soon forgotten their mirth in their new joy.

And then other guests were presently coming in, and Mrs. Frey, looking startlingly fine and pretty in her fresh ruches and new tie, was saying pleasant things to everybody, while Ethel and Meg, tripping lightly in and out, brought in the dishes.

As there was no parlor, guests were received in the curtained end of the gallery. No one was disposed to be formal, and when the old Professor entered with a little brown-paper parcel, which he declared, after his greetings, to contain his dinner, everybody felt that the etiquette of the occasion was not to be very strict or in the least embarra.s.sing.

Of course Mrs. Frey, as hostess, "hoped the Professor would reconsider, and have a slice of the Christmas turkey"; but when they had presently all taken their seats at the table, and the eccentric guest had actually opened his roll of bread and cheese upon his empty plate, over which he began to pa.s.s savory dishes to his neighbors, she politely let him have his way. Indeed, there was nothing else to do, as he declared--declining the first course with a wave of his hand--that he had come "yust for de sake of sociapility."

"I haf seen efery day doze children work und sing so nize togedder yust like leetle mans und ladies, so I come yust to eggsbress my t'anks for de compliment, und to make de acquaintance off doze nize y'ung neighbors." This with a courtly bow to each one of the children separately. And he added in a moment: "De dinner iss very fine, but for me one dinner iss yust like anudder. Doze are all externals."

To which measured and kindly speech Conrad could not help replying, "It won't be an external to us, Professor, by the time we get through."

"Oho!" exclaimed the old man, delighted with the boy's ready wit.

"Dot's a wery schmart boy you got dhere, Mrs. Vrey."

At this exhibition of broken English the twins, who were waiting on the table, thought it safe to rush to the kitchen on pretence of changing plates, while Dorothea, seated at the Professor's left, found it necessary to bite both lips and to stare hard at the vinegar-cruet for fully a second to keep from laughing. Then, to make sure of her self-possession, she artfully changed the subject, remarking, dryly,

"My nickel buyed the ice."