A Dear Little Girl's Thanksgiving Holidays

"We're a surprise party," spoke up Esther Ann.

"And we're a good-by party, too," added Reba.

"We've all brought you something," Alcinda spoke.

"We are going to stay an hour," Letty added.

Here Esther Ann darted forward with a bag of nuts which she plumped down in Edna's lap. "There," she said, "you must take those along with you."

Next, Reba presented a neat little book. It looked very religious, Edna thought, but the cover was pretty and there was an attractive picture in it.

Alcinda came next with a very ornate vase which Edna remembered seeing on the glass case in Mr. Hewlett's store.

Letty brought the figure of a cunning cat playing with a ball; this Edna liked very much. Some brought candy, some brought cakes, one brought a paper doll, another a little cup and saucer, but each one had something to contribute till Edna exclaimed: "Why, it is just like a birthday, and these are lovely presents."

"Oh, they're nothing but some little souvenirs," remarked Esther Ann loftily. "We wanted you to have them to remember us by."

"I shall never forget you, never," said Edna earnestly, "and I thank you ever and ever so much." She gathered up her booty and piled it on the table, then some one proposed a game, and they amused themselves till grandma sent out for nuts, cider, apples and cakes, which feast ended the entertainment, though it is safe to say it lasted more than an hour. At the last, the girls all crowded around Edna to kiss her good-night and to make their farewells, and then, like a flock of birds, they all took flight, scurrying home by the light of their lanterns, some across the street, some down, some up.

As the sound of the last merry voice died away, Edna threw herself into her grandmother's arms. "Oh, grandma," she cried, "wasn't it a lovely surprise? Did you know about it?"

"Not so very long before. Reliance came and told me what the girls wanted to do, and I promised to help in any way that I could."

"And was that why you sent me up for the glasses? I didn't tell you after all that I couldn't find them."

"I didn't expect you to," said her grandmother, laughing. "I only told you to go see if you could find them so as to get you out of the way and keep you occupied long enough to allow the girls to come in."

"I didn't hear the front door shut."

"No, for they came around by way of the side door, and tip-toed in by way of the dining-room."

"Well, it was lovely," sighed Edna in full content.

Although the real farewells had been said on that evening, that was not quite the last of it, for the girls were gathered in a body by the church the next morning when Edna drove by on her way to the train. She was squeezed in the back seat of the carriage between her mother and her Aunt Alice. Ben was on the front seat with his grandfather. Reliance at the gate was waving a tearful farewell, a white kitten under one arm and a grey one under the other. Grandma herself stood in the doorway. "Good-by! Good-by!" sounded fainter and fainter from Reliance, but the word was taken up by the girls who shouted a perfect chorus of good-bys as the black horses trotted nimbly along and bore Edna out of sight.

CHAPTER XII

HOW ARE YOU?

In what seemed an incredibly short time, Edna was getting out at the station nearest her own home. Ben and his mother had parted from them an hour before and were now on their way to their own home. Ben, however, would return on Monday to take up his college work again.

"There they are!" were the first words Edna heard as she and her mother descended from the train. And then the boys rushed forward to hug and kiss both herself and her mother and to make as much fuss over them as if they had been gone a year.

"Gee! but I'm glad to see you," cried Charlie. "It hasn't seemed like home at all without you, mother."

"Didn't you have a good time at Mrs. Porter's?" asked Edna.

"Had a high old time," responded Frank. "Here, let me take some of those things. You look like country travellers with all those bundles. What you got there?"

"Oh, things," returned Edna vaguely. "All sorts of things the girls gave me to bring home."

"You look like a regular old emigrant with so many boxes and bags."

"We couldn't get them all in the trunk," Edna explained, "and so we had to bring them this way. When did you get back, Frank?"

"Last night. We came home with father."

"Then you haven't had such a very long time in which to miss us," said Mrs. Conway, with a smile.

"Well, it seemed like a long time," returned Frank, "Nothing ever does go right when you're away, mother."

"What special thing has gone wrong this time?" asked his mother.

"Oh, I couldn't find anything I wanted this morning, and nobody knew where anything was, and Celia didn't know how to fix anything, and all that."

Mrs. Conway laughed. "That shows how I spoil you all. I am afraid I missed my boys, too, and am glad to get back to them."

"Where's Celia?" asked Edna.

"She's home. We all came up together last night. Lizzie had waffles for supper, and Frank ate ten pieces," spoke up Charlie.

"Well, that was all I could get," said Frank, in an injured way. "Lizzie said there were no more."

"Oh, Frank, Frank," laughed his mother. "Well, at any rate, I am glad to know my absence has not affected your appetite."

"Tell us what you did at the Porter's," said Edna.

"Oh, we just racketed around. We went to a fierce old football game, and we did all sorts of stunts in the house. Steve and Roger have a fine little workshop. I don't believe I like living right in the city, though. We boys have a heap more fun at a place like this where we can get out-of-doors. Roger and Steve say so, too."

"I am glad you are so well content," observed Mrs. Conway.

"There's Celia," Edna sang out, seeing some one on the porch watching for them. It was a chill, wintry morning, and they were all glad to hurry indoors to the warm fire. The house looked cozy and cheerful, yellow chrysanthemums in tall vases graced the hall and library; in the latter, an open grate fire glowed, and Edna looked around complacently. "It is kind of nice to get home," she remarked. "I love it at grandma's, but I reckon we all like our own home better than other people's. How are you, Celia? Tell me everything that has been going on at school. How is Dorothy? Did you have a club-meeting and was it a nice one? Oh, I must tell you about the Elderflowers, mustn't I, mother? Has Agnes gone back to college? Have you seen Miss Eloise?"

"Dear me," cried Celia, "what a lot of questions. I wonder if I can answer them all. Let me see. I'll have to go backwards, I think. I haven't seen Miss Eloise, but some of the girls have. She and her sister dined at the Ramseys on Thanksgiving Day."

"I know they had a good dinner, then," remarked Edna, "for I was there myself last Thanksgiving."

"Agnes has gone back to college. Dorothy is well. We had a nice club-meeting, and I missed my little sister's dear, round, little face. Dorothy has been so impatient that she can hardly wait to see you. She has been calling me up at intervals all morning to know if you had come yet. There is the telephone now. No doubt it is Dorothy calling."

Edna flew to the 'phone and Celia heard. "Yes, this is Edna. Oh, hello, Dorothy. I'm well, how are you? I don't know; I'll see. Oh, no, you come over here; that will be much nicer. I have some things to show you. What's that? Yes, indeed, I am glad to get back." Then a little tinkle of laughter. "You are a goosey goose; I'm not going to tell you. Come over. Yes, right away if you want to, Dorothy."

She went back to her sister, and established herself in her lap, putting one arm around her neck and stretching out her feet to the warmth of the fire. "It was Dorothy," she said.

"That was quite evident, my dear," returned Celia. "What was it you wouldn't tell her?"

"Oh, Dorothy is such a goose. She was afraid I had gotten to like some of the Overlea girls better than I do her. Just because I wrote to her about Reliance and Alcinda and all of them. Just as if I couldn't like more than one girl. Don't you think it is silly, sister, for anyone to want you to have no other friend, I mean no other best friend? Of course I love Dorothy dearly, but I love Jennie, too, and I am very fond of Netty Black, and, oh, lots of girls. Are you that way about Agnes, Celia?"

Celia felt a pang of self-reproach, for it must be admitted that she had felt a little jealous of the new friends Agnes was making at college. "I don't suppose I should be?" she answered after a pause. "I suppose it is very selfish and unfair to feel that way about it. Mother says it is very conceited of a person to think she can satisfy every need of a friend, and that it shows only love of self, and not love of your friend, when you want to exclude others from her friendship, and I am sure I don't want to be either selfish or conceited, and I should hate to be called a jealous person."