Part 3 (1/2)
”Papa says I can have a pony and cart,” said Patty; ”and I could drive over every day.”
”A pony and cart!” exclaimed Helen Preston. ”Won't that be perfectly lovely! I've always wanted one of my own. And shall you have man-servants, and maid-servants? Oh, Patty, you never could run a big establishment like that. You'll have to have a housekeeper.”
”I'm going to try it,” said Patty, laughing. ”It will be an experiment, and, of course, I shall make lots of blunders at first; but I think it's a pity if a girl nearly sixteen years old can't keep house for her own father.”
”So do I,” said Laura. ”And, anyhow, if you get into any dilemmas we'll all come over and help you out.”
The girls laughed at this; for Laura Russell was a giddy little feather-head, and couldn't have kept house for ten minutes to save her life.
”Much good it would do Patty to have the Tea Club help her keep house,”
said Florence Dougla.s.s. ”But we'll all make her lovely things to go to housekeeping with. I shall be real sensible, and make her sweeping-caps and ironing-holders.”
”Oh, I can beat that for sensibleness,” cried Ethel Holmes. ”I read about it the other day, and it's a broom-bag. I haven't an idea what it's for; but I'll find out, and I'll make one.”
”One's no good,” said Marian sagely. ”Make her a dozen while you're about it.”
”Oh, do they come by dozens?” said Ethel, in an awestruck voice. ”Well, I guess I won't make them then. I'll make her something pretty. A pincus.h.i.+on all over lace and pin ribbons, or something like that.”
”That will be lovely,” said Laura. ”I shall embroider her a tablecloth.”
”You'll never finish it,” said Patty, who well knew how soon Laura's bursts of enthusiasm spent themselves. ”You'd better decide on a doily.
Better a doily done than a tablecloth but begun.”
”Oh, I'll tell you-what we can do, girls,” said Polly Stevens. ”Let's make Patty a tea-cloth, and we'll each write our name on it, and then embroider it, you know.”
”Lovely!” cried Christine. ”Just the thing. Who'll hemst.i.tch it? I won't.
I'll embroider my name all right, but I hate to hemst.i.tch.”
”I'll hemst.i.tch it,” said Elsie Morris. ”I do beautiful hemst.i.tching.”
”So do I,” said Helen Preston. ”Let me do half.”
”Ethel and I hemst.i.tch like birds,” said Lillian Desmond. ”Let's each do a side,--there'll be four sides, I suppose.”
”Well, the tea-cloth seems in a fair way to get hemst.i.tched,” said Patty. ”You can put a double row around it, if you like, and I'll be awfully glad to have it. I'll use it the first Sat.u.r.day afternoon after I get settled.”
”I wish I knew where you're going to live,” said Ethel. ”I'd like to have a correct mental picture of that first Sat.u.r.day afternoon.”
”It's a beautiful day for walking,” said Polly Stevens. ”Let's all go out, and take a look at the Warner place. Something tells me that you'll decide to live there.”
”I hope something else will tell you differently, soon,” said Marian, ”for I'll never give my consent to that arrangement. However, I'd just as lieve walk out there, if only to convince you what a forlorn old place it is.”
”Come on; let's go, then. We can be back in an hour, and have tea afterwards. I'll get the key from Mr. Martin, as we go by.”
Like a bombarding army the Tea Club stormed the old Warner house, and once inside its Colonial portal, they made the old walls ring with their laughter. The wide hall was dark and gloomy until Elsie Morris flung open the door at the other end, and let in the December suns.h.i.+ne.
”Seek no farther,” she cried dramatically. ”We have crossed the Rubicon and found the Golden Fleece! This is the place of all others for our Tea Club meeting, and it doesn't matter what the rest of the house may be like. Patty, you will kindly consider the matter settled.”