"Mittie Dupong, of course!" answered Allison. "And Flynn Willis and Cad Bailey and all that set we were so disgusted with at Carter Brown's party. Didn't you mean them, mother?"

"Yes," said Mrs. Walton, well pleased that the tale had been interpreted so quickly. "I must confess that I told the story solely for the moral I wanted to tack on to the end of it. You do not know how my heart has ached for Ida. Poor misguided child! From what I have heard of her aunt I think she must be like Hertha's father, and made Ida feel that she had no sympathy with her childish love-affairs. Then Ida made the mistake that Hertha did, wove her ideals in secret, and fitted them on the first boy who pleased her fancy. Once wrapped in them she was blind to all his faults, and could not judge him as other people did. She made a hero of him. I blame her aunt as much as I do her, because she did not teach her long ago, as Hildgardmar did his daughter.

"Little girls begin very early sometimes to dream about that far-away land of Romance. The teasing questions older people ask them often set them to thinking seriously of it. They call their little playmates their sweethearts, and imagine the admiration and fondness they have for them is the love that is written in the stars. n.o.body explains to them that they will outgrow their early ideals as they do their dresses.

"I can remember how my ideals used to change. When I was a little girl, about as old as Elise, I thought that my Prince Charming would be like the one in the story of the Sleeping Beauty. I dreamed of sitting all day beside him on a crystal throne, with a crown on my head and a sceptre in my hand. But as I grew older I realized how stupid that would be, and I fashioned him after the figures that flitted across my mirror in the world of books. He was as handsome as a Greek G.o.d, and the feats he performed could have been possible only in the days of the Round Table.

"Then I outgrew that ideal. Others took its place, but when a woman grown, I held up the one that was the best my woman's heart could fashion, I found that my prince measured just to the stature of an honest man, simple and earnest and true. That was all--no Greek G.o.d, no dashing knight, but a strong, manly man, whose love was my life's crown of happiness."

She glanced up at the portrait over the mantel, and there was an impressive pause. Lloyd broke the silence presently, speaking very fast in an embarra.s.sed sort of way.

"But, Mrs. Walton, don't you think there was some excuse for Ida besides her being blinded to Mistah Bannon's faults? He made her believe she had such a good influence ovah him that she thought it was her _duty_ to disobey her aunt, because it was moah important that he should be reformed than that she should be obeyed in a mattah that seemed unreasonable to Ida."

"Yes," was the hesitating answer. "But Ida was largely influenced to take that stand by the books she had been reading. That's another matter I want to speak about, since my little girls have confessed to the reading of 'Daisy Dale' and the 'Heiress of Dorn.' While there is nothing particularly objectionable in such books in one way, in another their influence is of the very worst. The characters are either unreal or overdrawn, or they are so interestingly coloured that they are like the figures of the shepherd lad and the long-haired page in the mirrors of Hertha and Huberta. In watching them a girl is apt to weave her web 'to fit _their_ unworthy shoulders, and forget how high is the stature of a perfect prince.' Such books are poor yardsticks, and give one false ideas of value and measurement.

"Ned's plea is what nearly every wild young fellow makes, and nine times out of ten it appeals to a girl more than any other argument he could use. 'Give _me_ the mantle, Hildegarde. It will help me to live right.'

So she takes him in hand to reform him. Nothing could be purer and higher than the motives which prompt her to sacrifice everything to what she considers her duty. I had a schoolmate once who married a bright young fellow because he came to her with Ned's plea. Her father said, 'Let him reform first. What he will not do for a sweetheart, he will never do for a wife.' But she would not listen, and to-day she is living in abject poverty and cruel unhappiness. He is rarely sober.

"In olden times a man didn't come whining to a maiden and say, 'I long to be a knight, but I am too weak to do battle unaided. Be my ladye fair and help me win my spurs.' No, she would have laughed him to scorn. He won his spurs first, and only after he had proved himself worthy and received his accolade, did she give him her hand.

"Oh, my dear girls, if you would _only_ do as Hildegarde did, ask first if all be well before you clip the golden web from the loom and give it to the one who begs for it! He is not the one written for you in the stars--he does not measure to the stature of a true prince if he comes with such a selfish demand as Ned did."

"That is a story I'll nevah forget," said Lloyd, soberly. "I think it ought to be printed and put in the seminary library for all the othah girls to read."

"And some of the fathers and mothers, too," added Betty. "Ida's aunt ought to have a copy."

"No, it is too late," remarked Katie. "It's a case of what grandpa would call 'locking the stable after the horse is stolen.'"

There was a knock at the door. "Supper is served," announced Barbry's voice in the hall.

CHAPTER XV.

THANKSGIVING DAY

ONE might have thought, watching the pillow-fight which went on that night at bedtime, that the fairy-tale had been told too soon. The five girls, romping and shrieking through halls and bedrooms as the sport went on, fast and furious, seemed too young for its grave lessons. But "the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts," even when its actions are most childish and careless, and the little tale made a deeper impression than the teller of it realized.

For one thing, Betty laid aside the book she was writing, although she had secretly cherished the hope of having the story of Gladys and Eugene published sometime during the coming year.

"I might be ashamed of it when I am grown," she explained, quoting old Hildgardmar: ""Tis but a little mantle thou couldst weave this year, at best, fit but to clothe the shoulders of yon curly shepherd lad.' If I am to outgrow my ideals as I do my dresses, I ought to wait. I want the critics to say of me 'Thou waitedst till thy woman's fingers wrought the best that lay within thy woman's heart.' So I'll lay the book aside for a few years, till I've learned more about people. But I'll write it some day."

It was that same night, while they were getting ready for bed, that the Shadow Club was disbanded.

"I nevah want to heah that name again," exclaimed Lloyd, shaking out her hair and beginning to brush it. "It was so disgraced by being dragged into the newspapahs with such a lie, that it almost makes me ill whenevah I think of it."

"Oh, you don't want to give up the work for the mountain people, do you?" asked Allison, in dismay.

"No, but I'd like to stop until aftah the holidays. We have so much to do getting ready for Christmas. Besides, I'd like to be able to tell the girls that there wasn't such a club any moah. The next term we could make a fresh start with a new name, just the five of us."

"Oh, let's call it 'The Order of Hildegarde!'" cried Betty, enthusiastically. "And all the time we are doing 'broidery and fair needlework' to sell for the mountain people, we can be trying to weave our ideals as Hildegarde did, so that we may not miss the happiness that is written for us in the stars."

"I'd like that," exclaimed Allison, entering into the new plan eagerly.

"We could have club colours this time, gold and rose, the colour of the warp and woof, you know."

"Yes, yes! That's it!" a.s.sented Kitty, with equal enthusiasm. "Streamers of narrow gold and rose ribbon, pinned by a tiny gilt star, to remind us of what is written in the stars. Don't you think that would be lovely, Katie?"

"Yes," answered Katie, "but I think if we want to keep the order a secret we oughtn't to wear such a badge in public. It would be safer to keep them in our 'inner rooms.' But we could use them in all sorts of ways, the ribbons crossed on our pincushions, or streamers of them to tie back our curtains, or broad bands on our work-baskets and embroidery-bags."

Lloyd gave ready a.s.sent. "That would suit me, for my room at home is already furnished in rose colah. All I would have to do is to add the gold and the sta'hs."

"And mine is a white and gold room," said Betty. "I'll only have to give it a few touches of rose colour."

A few more words settled the matter, as the girls hovered around the fire in their night-dresses, and then the establishment of the new Order of Hildegarde was celebrated by a pillow fight, the like of which for noise and vigour had never before been known at The Beeches.

In the hard work that followed after their return to school, time slipped by so fast that Thanksgiving Day came surprisingly soon. Nearly all the pupils and teachers went home for the short vacation, or visited friends in Louisville. Even the president and his wife went away. Only six girls besides Lloyd and Betty were left to follow the matron to church on Thanksgiving morning.

It was a lonesome walk. A Sabbath-like stillness pervaded the quiet Valley, and the ringing of the bell in the ivy-grown belfry of the little stone church, and the closed doors at the post-office, gave the girls the feeling that Sunday had somehow come in the middle of the week. As they crossed the road toward the iron gate leading into the churchyard, Lloyd looked up past the manse toward The Beeches, hoping for a glimpse of the Walton girls. Then she remembered that Allison had told her that they were all going to town to celebrate the day with her Aunt Elise, and the feeling of being left out of everybody's good times began to weigh heavily upon her.

No smoke was coming out of any of the chimneys, either at The Beeches or Edgewood. When she thought of Locust, also cold and empty, with no fire on its hospitable hearths, no feast on its ample table, no cheer anywhere within its walls, and her family far away, a wave of homesickness swept over her that brought a mist over her eyes. She could scarcely see as they went up the steps.

Mrs. Bond, with her usual dread of being late, had hurried them away from the seminary much too soon. Not more than half a dozen carriages had driven into the grove around the little country church when they reached the door, and only a few people were waiting inside. As Lloyd sat in the solemn silence that was broken only now and then by a stifled cough or the rustle of a turning leaf, she had hard work to battle back the tears. But with a sudden determination to overcome such a feeling, she sat up very straight in the end of the pew, and pressed her lips together hard.

"It's almost wicked of me," she thought, "to feel so bad about the one thing I can't have when there are a thousand other things that ought to make me happy. It's only a pah't of my bo'ding-school experiences, and will be ovah in a little while. I don't suppose anybody in church has moah to be thankful for than I have."

She glanced furtively across the aisle. "I'm thankful that I'm not that old Mistah Saxon with his wooden leg, or that poah little Mrs. Crisp in the cawnah, with five children to suppo't, and one of them a baby that has fits."

Her gaze wandered down the opposite aisle. "And I'm suah it's something to be thankful for not to have a nose like Libbie Simms, or such a fussy old fathah as Sue Bell Wade has to put up with. And I'm glad I haven't such poah taste as to make a rainbow out of myself, wearing so many different colahs at once as Miss McGill does. Five different shades of red on the same hat are enough to set one's teeth on edge. I believe I could go on all day, counting the things I'm glad I haven't got; and as for the things I have--" She began checking them off on her finger-tips.

There was a handful before she had fairly begun to count; home, family, perfect health, the love of many friends, the opportunities that filled every day to the brim.

The organist pulled out the stops and began playing an old familiar chant as a voluntary. As the full, sweet chords filled the church Lloyd could almost hear the words rising with the music:

"My cup runneth over.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me All the days of my life."

As the music swelled louder, her counting was interrupted by the opening of the door and the entrance of several generations of the Moore family, who had come back to Oaklea for a Thanksgiving reunion. It seemed good to Lloyd to see the old judge's white head gleaming like silver in its accustomed pew. His benign face fairly radiated cheerfulness and good-will as he took his place once more among his old neighbours.

Rob walked just behind him, so tall and erect, it seemed to Lloyd that he must have grown several inches in the three short months since they had cut the last notches in the measuring-tree. As he turned to throw his overcoat across the back of the seat, his quick glance spied Lloyd and Betty several pews in the rear, and he flashed them a smile of greeting. At the same time, so quickly and deftly that Mrs. Bond did not see the motion, he held up a package that he had carried in under his overcoat, and instantly dropped it out of sight again on the seat. Then he straightened himself up beside his grandfather, as if he were a model of decorum.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'IT'S LIKE A BIT OF HOME TO SEE YOU AGAIN.'"]

Lloyd and Betty exchanged a meaning glance which seemed to say, "That five-pound box of Huyler's best he promised us;" and Lloyd found herself wondering several times during the long service how he would manage to present it. That problem did not worry Rob, however. As the congregation slowly moved down the aisles and out into the vestibule, he elbowed his way to Mrs. Bond, standing beside her eight charges like a motherly old hen.

"Good morning, Mrs. Bond," he exclaimed, in his straightforward, boyish way. "You're going to take me under your wing and let me walk to the gate with Betty and Lloyd, aren't you! I'll be as good as grandfather if you will, and I'll even take him along if it's necessary to have anybody to vouch for me."

His mischievous smile was so irresistible that she gave him a motherly pat on the shoulder. "Run along," she exclaimed, laughingly. "I'll follow presently. There are several people I want to speak to first."