Part 3

“I must go in,” she said, “and I want Lisette to help me. But, if you wish, you four may go for a ride in the Park or along the Avenue. But you must promise not to get out of the cab. The chauffeur is entirely reliable, and if you stay in the cab, you cannot get lost. Be back here in one hour, please.”

“We will,” chorused the four, so Mrs. McGuire and Lisette went into the hotel, and the four delighted young folk went for a further ride.

Their course down the Avenue was slow, owing to the crowded traffic; they had ample opportunity for observing the people, an amusement of which Betty never tired. Then afterwards a short spin in the Park, where the lights had already begun to gleam through the early winter dusk.

“Now for home,” said Jack decisively, when the hour had elapsed; and back they went to their hotel.

But when they entered their own sitting-room, nobody was there,—no tree, no presents, and no sign of any human being.

Betty opened the door of her mother’s bedroom, but that, too, was unoccupied, as, indeed, were all the bedrooms.

Betty looked frightened, and said, in a half-whisper: “Oh, _do_ you suppose anything has happened to Mother?”

Then Jack laughed outright.

“Oh, Betty,” he said; “can’t you guess? I’ll wager Mother and Lisette are in the dining-room, and they’re fixing the tree in there!”

Sure enough, the dining-room door was closed, and when Betty flew to open it, she found it was locked as well.

“Let us in, Mother; let us in!” she cried.

“Not yet, my child,” said Mrs. McGuire, opening the door a tiny crack and peeping out. “You must all amuse yourselves till dinner-time.”

“Oh, can’t we help fix it?” said Jack.

“No; I’ve plenty of help in here, and you must keep out and not bother.”

Then the door was shut and locked again, and the young folks laughed to find themselves with occupation gone.

“All right; let’s get up a surprise for _her_,” said Betty.

“Oh, yes!” cried Jack; “just the thing! What’ll it be?”

“Wait. I’ll have to think. Oh, I’ll tell you, Jack; you go down to the flower place, and get a lot of white carnations—just heaps of ’em. And then get a lot of holly, and bring ’em all up, and I’ll show you. Oh, wait—get the biggest holly wreath you can find, and a paper of pins!”

Obediently Jack went off, and as the big hotel was able to supply such demands, he brought back everything Betty asked for.

“It won’t be much,” said Betty, as she tied a big towel over her pretty frock for an apron. “Come in my room, all of you, so she won’t see it if she comes out.”

The other three followed Betty, and she disclosed her plan. First she filled the center of the big wreath with white carnations, having first crisscrossed it closely with string, to keep the blossoms in place. Then she set the others to work picking off the red berries from the bunch of holly Jack had brought, sticking a pin through each. With these prepared berries Betty formed letters on the white background, and as she deftly did her task they saw the words grow under her fingers, “Merry Christmas to Mother.”

“Fine!” cried Stub. “Betty, you’re a real genius! I declare it’s the prettiest wreath I ever saw!”

It _was_ pretty, for the holly wreath framed the loving greeting spelled out on the white carnations, and Betty’s true eye had spaced the letters admirably.

It was not quite finished when Mrs. McGuire emerged from the dining-room. But Betty hastily stuck in the remaining pins with their red berry heads, and Jack asked Mrs. McGuire not to peep into Betty’s room.

“Indeed, I won’t,” was the reply. “I’ve only time to dress for dinner, and you young people had better scamper if you want to have any evening left for your tree.”

Scamper they did, and soon a very hungry but jolly party made its way down to the dining-room.

The girls were in festival dress because it was Christmas eve. Their white frocks of filmy mousseline were cut out a little at the throat, and red sashes and hair-ribbons gave an air of Christmas to their costumes. Each wore a holly spray in her hair, and Jack declared himself proud of the visions of loveliness that graced his party.

But notwithstanding the jolly time they were having, and the excitement of it all, there was no lingering after dinner.

Though the girls would have liked to stay down-stairs and listen to the music and watch the people, yet the tree seemed to call loudly to them even through the closed door. So up they went, Betty’s little face fairly aglow with the happiness of her first real Christmas. She held her mother’s hand tightly as, at last, Lisette threw open the door of the dining-room, and they all went in.

The tree was a marvel. Stalwart porters of the hotel had set it in place, and had assisted Mrs. McGuire to decorate it. It shimmered and glittered with tinsel ropes; it sparkled with shining ornaments; it trembled with tiny lighted candles, and it fairly blazed with hundreds of tiny electric lights of all colors. This was one of Mrs. McGuire’s surprises. Even the Grahams had never seen a Christmas tree electrically lighted, and as for Stub—he fairly whistled in ecstasy.

“Oh, _what_ a corker!” he exclaimed, for more grammatical language seemed inadequate.

Betty drew closer to her mother’s side and slipped her arm around her waist, as she stood speechless before the beautiful tree.

“For me!” she exclaimed, her eyes as bright as the electrics themselves.

“Yes,” said her mother, bending to kiss the top of her child’s head. “And for Jack,” she added, holding out her other hand to the boy, who came, a bit shyly, to her embrace.

“And for all of us,” shouted Stub gaily; “you can’t leave us out, Mrs. McGuire, and though my small sister seems for the moment to be speechless, yet I can assure you she thinks it’s a very nice tree.”

“_Very nice tree!_” cried Agnes; “it’s the gorgeousest, wonderfulest tree that ever was on the face of the earth! I know it is!”

After they had admired it over and over, Mrs. McGuire proposed that they take off the gifts, assuring them that such a proceeding would not mar the effect of the tree.

So the ever polite and ready Jack, aided by Stub when the gifts were flung high, took down the presents one by one, and delivered them to those whose names were written on them.

Somehow there seemed to be lots of gifts. For five people, each giving to every one else, made a good many, and then there were a lot of extra ones that just seemed to come from Santa Claus himself.

Of course Lisette was not forgotten, and she stood in the background, delighted beyond words to see Betty’s pleasure in her beautiful Christmas tree.

Mrs. McGuire’s present to her daughter was a gold locket containing a miniature of her own lovely face. It hung from a slender gold chain, and no gift could have pleased Betty more.

“I shall always wear it,” she said, as her mother clasped it round her throat; “and, Mother, you must always wear my gift.”

Her mother was greatly surprised at the diamond brooch, and wondered how Betty had sufficient taste and judgment to select such a beauty. So Betty told how Mrs. Sanderson had helped her, and all admired the lovely jewel when it was pinned at the top of its owner’s delicate lace bodice.

The tables were filled with the various trinkets and knickknacks, and the floor was strewn with tissue-papers and narrow red ribbons. Then Jack and Stub brought in the big Christmas greeting Betty and the others had made, and her mother was delighted at the pretty attention.

It was late indeed when they sought their beds, for a refection of ices and cakes had to be attended to, and some Christmas carols sung, and a Christmas dance indulged in. But at last all the lights were out, and the stars twinkled down on one of the happiest girls in the great city, a girl who was restfully sleeping after the joys of her first real Christmas.

III BETTY AT BOARDING-SCHOOL

It was New Year’s eve, and Betty, with her mother and Jack, was spending a few days at the Irvings’ in Boston. Betty was a great favorite with her grandfather, and the two spent delightful hours together as the old gentleman showed Betty the many places of interest in the city.

Mr. Irving was of somewhat eccentric nature, and he declared that he much preferred Betty’s frank and sometimes blunt straightforwardness to what he called the “airs and graces” of more fashionably trained young girls.

But Mrs. Irving did not share her husband’s views. She thought Betty decidedly lacking in many details of correct deportment, and she urged Mrs. McGuire to send Betty to a boarding-school for a year or two, that she might be properly trained to take her place in society later, with the demeanor becoming a well-bred young lady and an heiress.

“But Betty isn’t a young lady yet,” said Mrs. McGuire, looking troubled when these arguments were laid before her.

“Not exactly, perhaps,” returned her mother. “But she will live in a city ere long, and, as our descendant, should be made familiar with the finer points of correct behavior. Jack seems to pick up such things immediately, but Betty, though a dear child, is crude in her manner.”

“Small wonder,” said Mrs. McGuire, thinking of the lack of advantages in Betty’s early life.

“True enough; and that’s all the more reason why she should be placed in an atmosphere of correct deportment at once. She will learn much more by association with cultured young girls of her own age than by your individual tuition. You spoil her by letting her have her own way entirely too much, and you are blind to her faults. You know perfectly well, my dear, I have only Betty’s good at heart in the matter.”

Mrs. McGuire did know this, and yet she could not bear the idea of separation from her daughter, with whom she had been so lately reunited.

On New Year’s eve the Irvings had made a party for Betty. They had invited young people from some of the best families they knew, and both Betty and Jack were greatly pleased when they learned of it.

It was a very citified party, and quite unlike the merry gatherings of Greenborough children. The hours were from seven to ten, and the first part of the evening the guests sat round the rooms, in small gilt chairs that had been brought in for the occasion, and listened to the songs and stories of a professional entertainer.

It was a charming young woman who told the stories and sang the songs, and after each number the children clapped their hands sedately and waited for the next.

Secretly Betty thought it rather tame, and would have preferred a rollicking game or a merry dance. But she applauded with the others and tried to appear politely pleased.

After the program all marched decorously to the dining-room, where a pleasant little supper was served. Then the guests took leave, each making a correct courtesy to the hostess, and expressing their pleasure as if by rote.

“Well, if that wasn’t the _stiffest_ party!” said Betty to her mother, when they were alone later. “Those children were just like wooden images.”

Mrs. McGuire looked troubled.

“Betty dear,” she said, “you don’t see these things quite rightly. Your grandmother thinks those children act correctly, and that you don’t. But, you see, city life is quite different from that of a small village. How would you like to move to live in a big city, Betty?”

“And give up Denniston? My beautiful home! Oh, Mother, I don’t want to do that!”

“No, and I don’t want you to. Well, we’ll see what can be done.”

The “seeing” resulted in long talks by the elders of the family, and these talks resulted in a decision to send Betty at once to a boarding-school at Hillside Manor, a fine country place about a hundred miles away.

As the winter term was just beginning, she was to go directly, without returning to Greenborough.

The school was most highly recommended, and Mrs. McGuire was persuaded that it would give Betty the “finish” she needed.

But the plan did not please Betty at all. She did not rebel,—that was not her way,—but she expressed her feelings in the matter so clearly that there was no doubt as to her state of mind.

“I don’t want to go, Mother,” she said; “I hate to be with a lot of girls—I want my own family and my _home_. Oh, Mother, must I leave my home when I love it so?”

“Yes, Betty darling,” said her mother, though strongly tempted to say “No”; “I see it is for your good to send you away, and I’m sure you ought to go. But I shall miss you dreadfully, and just count the days till your return.”

“It’s hard lines, Betty,” said Jack; “but as long as they all think you ought to go, I should think you’d be glad to go and learn the right sort of thing, whatever it is. Old Tutor Nixon is wise and all that, but he can’t fill the bill in other ways. At least that’s what Grandma Irving thinks, and so do I, too.”

In fact, there was no one who agreed with Betty’s ideas except her grandfather.

“All bosh,” he said. “My granddaughter is a natural, unaffected, unspoiled girl. You send her off to Madam Tippetywitch, or whoever she is, and she’ll come back an artificial young miss, with no thought but for fashions and foolishness.”

But the old gentleman was entirely overruled by the determination of his wife, and Betty was sent away.

None of the family accompanied Betty to the school, as Mrs. Irving felt sure the child would be less homesick if she started off with a gay party of girls who were going back to their classes.

And so good-bys were said at the station in Boston, and Betty made the trip to Hillside in company with half a dozen school-girls, in charge of one of the teachers. It was a strange position in which Betty found herself. An heiress in her own right, she yet felt a sense of inferiority which she herself could not explain.

Her Irish ancestry revealed itself in her warm-hearted willingness to be friends with the girls, and her inherited New England nature made her reserved and sensitive to either real or apparent slights from them. The girls, notwithstanding their inborn good breeding and their past seasons at Hillside Manor, looked at Betty with ill-concealed curiosity. They knew she was an heiress, and that very fact made them hold aloof from her, lest they be suspected of a spirit of toadying to wealth.

But Betty did not appreciate this point, and assumed that the girls were not very cordial because they considered themselves her superiors. Each one spoke to her, politely enough, but in constrained, perfunctory fashion, and then, feeling their duty done, they resumed their own chatter about matters unknown to Betty. Miss Price, the teacher, was a pleasant-faced lady, but, after a few courteous words, she became absorbed in a book, looking up only now and then to glance at her young charges. After a time Betty’s spirit of independence became aroused. She wondered if she were excluded from the girls’ sociability because she herself was lacking in cordiality. Smiling pleasantly, she said to Ada Porter, who sat next to her: “Are you in my classes?”

“I don’t know, really,” said Ada, not unkindly, but entirely uninterested. “What classes are you in?”

“I don’t know,” said Betty, smiling at the absurdity of the conversation.

But Ada didn’t seem to think it humorous, and merely stared at Betty, as she said, “How queer!”

Betty colored. She felt awkward and tongue-tied, and yet, the more she realized her inability to impress these girls pleasantly, the more she determined to do so.

Then Betty bethought herself of a box of fine candies in her satchel, and taking it out, she passed it around to the other girls.

Murmuring conventional thanks, each accepted one bonbon, but declined a second one, and then Betty found herself with her box in her lap, gazing out of the window, as much alone as if there had been no one in the car.

But at last the three hours’ ride was over, and Betty’s hopeful nature looked forward to finding some among the pupils who would be more friendly than her traveling associates.

Omnibuses from the school met them at the station, and by chance Betty was put in with a dozen girls none of whom had been with her in the car.

But conditions were no better than before. They nodded diffidently to Betty, and then began to chatter to each other with the gay freedom of old acquaintances.

One girl, however, who sat opposite Betty, was also a new pupil. She had coal-black hair and bright black eyes, that darted quickly about, seeming to take in everything.

“You’re new, too, aren’t you?” she said at last, leaning over to seize Betty’s hand.

“Yes,” replied Betty, grateful for the word spoken voluntarily to her.

“So am I. I think the other girls are hateful to ignore us so. But don’t you mind; we’ll show them!”

Though this was independence of spirit, Betty couldn’t quite approve of the way it was expressed, nor of the belligerent wag of the head with which it was emphasized.

But the girl’s attitude was friendly toward her, if rather hostile toward the others, and lonely little Betty yearned for friendliness.

“Well, you see, they all know each other,” she said, smiling at the black-eyed one; “that makes such a difference, and they’ve so much to tell.”

“All right; let us know each other, then. My name’s Madeleine Gorman; what’s yours?”

“Betty McGuire,” said Betty, smiling into the friendly eyes.

“Betty! My, you are new! You must call yourself Elizabeth up here. Nicknames don’t go.”

“Well, I’d just as lief be called Elizabeth; I don’t mind. But I’m Betty at home.”

“Yes; I’m Maddy at home, and Mad, and Mother calls me Lina. But I’m sure Madeleine’s the ticket in a fashionable boarding-school.”

“Then you’ve been here before?”

“No, not here. But to three other grand schools. Mother’s always changing about when she hears of a more ‘select’ one.”

Betty was a bit bewildered. Surely the ambitions of Madeleine’s mother were in line with those of Mrs. Irving, and yet Betty couldn’t imagine her grandmother talking like that! She felt sure the Irvings _were_ “select,” but she felt equally sure they would never proclaim it in words.

She gave up the problem as too difficult, but, greatly cheered by Madeleine’s cordiality, she met her friendly advances half-way, and when they reached the school they felt really well acquainted. Together they went to the principal.

Miss Frelinghuysen was an imposing-looking lady with sharp features and sharp eyes. She welcomed them with effusion, called each “my dear child,” and expressed hope that each would be happy and contented at the school.

“May we room together, Elizabeth and I?” Madeleine asked.

Miss Frelinghuysen appeared to hesitate.

“Do you wish it, my dear?” she asked of Betty.

“Yes,” replied Betty, hastily, concluding that a girl she knew to be friendly was preferable to any utter stranger; “yes, I should like it.”

“Very well, then you may, my dear.”

“You’re a trump,” said Madeleine, squeezing Betty’s arm as they went away; “I was so afraid you wouldn’t room with me.”

“Why not?”

“Oh, I don’t know. You might feel too grand. You’ve just come into a lot of money, they tell me.”

“But that doesn’t make any difference to young girls,” said Betty, simply.

“Ho! doesn’t it?” said Madeleine, at which Betty laughed outright. She felt sure it couldn’t be true.

Hillside Manor was a large and rather magnificent house, yet when Betty and Madeleine reached their room, they found it small and cramped. There was only one window, and though the two beds were narrow, they left but little space to move about. There was only one wash-stand, and, accustomed of late to having nice things about her, Betty looked around in dismay.

It was not that she so much minded not having elaborate furnishings, but such close quarters to be shared with another made her feel hampered, and she thought longingly of her lovely big room at Denniston, with the dainty fittings all her own.

And yet she knew she would not like to room alone at the school. That was an awful loneliness to look forward to.

So she began unpacking her things to dress for dinner. Madeleine chattered all the time, seeming not to care whether Betty answered or not.

“You may have the top drawer of the dresser, and I’ll take the next,” said Madeleine, good-naturedly; “and we’ll divide the hooks in the wardrobe evenly. Which bed do you want?”

“I don’t care,” said Betty; “take your choice first.”

“All right; I’ll take this one,” and Madeleine flung two large hats on the bed she selected.

But as she immediately afterward piled a lot of her things on the other bed, it seemed to make little difference.

“Don’t mind those clothes,” she said apologetically. “Pile your own right on top of ’em. We’ll get ’em put away somehow.”

But there was no time then, as they must dress for dinner, and the gong would sound shortly.

Madeleine greatly admired Betty’s pretty rose-colored voile trimmed with delicate lace, and she was loud in her praise of Betty’s simple bits of jewelry.

“Oh, what a lovely locket!” she cried. “Let me wear it to-night, won’t you? I’d love to!”

Betty hesitated; she disliked to refuse her friend’s first request, but she couldn’t let any one else wear her locket, with her mother’s picture in it, too.

“I want to wear that myself,” she said frankly; “I always wear it afternoons. But you may wear my bangle instead, if you like.”

“Oh, yes, I’d love to,” and Madeleine slipped the pretty gold bangle on her wrist. “Won’t you lend me a hair-ribbon, Elizabeth, too? I see you’ve plenty of them, and mine are so old.”

“Certainly,” said Betty, willingly offering her box of new ribbons. Madeleine selected a pair of wide red ones, and gaily tied them on her black curls. As it happened, these were Betty’s favorite ribbons, and she had no other red ones, but she was wearing white ones herself, and she said nothing.

Madeleine helped herself to Betty’s cologne-water, and made free with several of her toilet appurtenances, and at last, after saying, “Oh, my dear, please lend me a handkerchief; mine are full of holes!” they went down-stairs.

Dinner was an awful ordeal. The girls sat at long tables, each headed by a teacher, and were expected to converse on light topics. Betty rather envied the ease with which most of them uttered trivial commonplaces, but she couldn’t help feeling that their accents and shrill little notes of laughter were artificial. Without even formulating her own thoughts, she felt that the girls were all self-conscious and critical of one another, and she conceived a sudden and violent antipathy to the whole atmosphere of the school that she knew she could never conquer.

Entirely unconscious of herself, Betty did not realize that she was not taking any part in the “light” conversation, and it was a shock when Miss Price said, in a somewhat mincing tone: “We want you to join in our chat, Miss McGuire. Suppose you tell us how you spent your Christmas day.” Straightforwardly Betty said:

“We spent our Christmas day in New York, at the Plaza Hotel.”

No sooner had she said this than she saw, by the expressions on the girls’ faces, she had made a mistake.

“How interesting!” said Miss Price; but it suddenly flashed on Betty that they all thought her remark ostentatious, and that it was, in some way, inexcusable to spend Christmas day away from one’s home.

She couldn’t help looking distressed, for there was not a trace of ostentation in her whole nature, and her enjoyment of her wealth was merely in the simple pleasures that it brought her, without thought of vanity or pride in the possession of it.

Never before had she been accused of this, nor was she now, in words, but there was no doubting the meaning of the looks directed at her.

Miss Price tactfully changed the subject, but Betty made no more contributions to the “light” conversation of that dinner.