THE TANGLED WEB SHE WOVE
The day following was clear and crisp, with biting, wintry air, but there was no sign of snow to make the boys happy, and give them an opportunity of realizing the much wished for sleigh ride.
"We had better go to town and get some of the shopping over with," suggested Dorothy to Tavia, when they had convinced the boys that it was too cold to go auto riding, and that this was the very best day in the week to do Christmas buying.
"All right, Doro," answered Tavia. "You're the coacher. I'll go wherever you like, only please don't ask me to select anything to go out to Glenwood—I want to forget there is such a place as Glenwood School."
"Why, Tavia!" exclaimed Dorothy. "You are surely going to send some remembrance to Mrs. Pangborn! Surely you would not forget the principal, even if you do overlook the teachers."
"Not a thing," declared Tavia, shaking her bronze head decidedly. "Fact is, I'm awfully hard up, Doro, and I would rather forget Pangborn than—go without a month's supply of fudge."
"Hard up! Why, Tavia, you wrote me you had five dollars to spend."
"So I did—then, but I lost it since."
"Lost it? How? Wasn't that too bad!"
"I should say so," replied Tavia, turning to her memorandum book, as if to dismiss the subject.
"But how did you lose it, Tavia?" persisted the sympathetic Dorothy.
"Oh, I didn't exactly lose it, but I had to spend it for other things," said Tavia with a show of impatience.
"Then I'm just going to divide with you," declared Dorothy, for she knew perfectly well that Tavia was not in the circumstances that she herself enjoyed, surmised that indeed Tavia did have to spend her holiday money for some needed articles.
"Oh, no, thank you," objected Tavia, the color racing into her cheeks, "I suppose I might have done without——"
"Now, you must let me have my way, Tavia," insisted Dorothy, instantly opening her pretty beaded purse to divide its contents.
"But, Doro, dear," faltered Tavia, "you don't understand. It was not for anything for myself——"
"Then all the more reason that you should be reimbursed," insisted Dorothy. "I don't want to know anything about it, but you must let me share with you. Why, what fun would I have giving and buying, with you just looking on?"
So Tavia said no more, but as she accepted the money from her loyal little friend a guilty flush would persist in staining her cheeks, and she avoided Dorothy's wondering blue eyes when she asked:
"Now, what are you going to send home? We must get the things first that will have to be sent away."
"I've fixed all that," stammered Tavia. "I won't have to get anything to send home."
"I didn't want to take her money," Tavia tried to tell herself, "and I was willing to tell her all about it, but she wouldn't listen. Now, if only I can manage to get Nat to keep quiet. But, at any rate, I did not mean to deceive Dorothy."
But all the same Tavia did not relish the handling of Dorothy's Christmas savings, and somehow she took little interest in all the possible gifts Dorothy made notes of, in preparation for the day's shopping in the city.
"I will have to tell Nat, I suppose," she was thinking, as she finally picked up the little shopping bag and was ready to start off with Dorothy. "I'll tell him to-night—but I do hate to. I wish Doro would not be so over-generous," and she crushed the money in the leather case and put it securely within the satchel.
"Come, Tavia, we will surely miss that train if you do not make haste," declared Dorothy for she could not understand why Tavia should not be more alert and more interested.
"I forgot my muff," pleaded Tavia, "and had to go back for it. I suppose I would forget my head, as mother says, if it were not tied on."
Dorothy smiled and hurried on, with Tavia following.
Surely Christmas shopping was something any girl should love, Dorothy thought, as she wondered why Tavia appeared so indifferent.
Meanwhile, Tavia was struggling with her conscience. She had accepted Dorothy's money reluctantly, it might have been, but at the same time she had taken it. And she told Dorothy her own money was spent for——
Tavia jerked her fox fur boa impatiently. How complicated the whole thing was getting! What difference did it make to Dorothy for what the five dollars had been expended? It was Tavia's own money. Her mother——
"Dear me!" sighed the girl secretly. "That makes it so much worse! Mother did try so hard to save that money for me so that I might not always have to depend upon the goodness of Dorothy and her folks."
"There's the train," called Dorothy, who was somewhat in advance of Tavia. "We will have to run! Look out for your purse!"
The mere mention of purse or money brought the hot blood to Tavia's cheeks again.
"I'll just tell her the whole thing when we get on the train," she promised herself. "If there is one thing I simply cannot stand it is a secret that threatens to pop out every time one turns around," and with that satisfying assurance Tavia was able to put aside her worry for the time being, and was soon sitting comfortably beside Dorothy in the city express, awake at last to the joys of holiday shopping and the prospect of being able, after all, to get some gifts for dear ones, "and perhaps," she pondered, "the old five dollars will stop haunting me."
But alas for the hope of forgetting evil! How strange it is that when one is tempted all shame and all self-respect seem to vanish, only to return with such gigantic power when the deed is done.
Tavia wanted to tell Dorothy what had become of the precious Christmas money. In fact, she was on the very point of unburdening her mind when the attention of both girls was directed to a frail little woman, who occupied the seat directly opposite them.
She was dressed in black, and had the palest face, and such great hollow eyes.
As if by some magnetic attraction both Tavia and Dorothy discovered that this woman was watching them very closely. In fact, she had her eyes so fastened on Dorothy's money, which Dorothy had been counting in her lap, that it actually appeared the woman must be unconscious of her own actions.
"Good thing eyes are not magnets," whispered Tavia, and Dorothy understood her perfectly.
"But how ill she looks!" answered Dorothy. "Perhaps her mind is not—right."
"Perhaps," acquiesced Tavia. "But I wish she would turn those black eyes in the other direction. She makes me creep."
Dorothy tucked her little purse away securely, and once more consulted her memorandum.
"I must get a little more ribbon for Aunt Winnie's bag," she began, "and I must not forget about Joe's magnifying glass. He is so fond of his nature work at school it will be useful as well as enjoyable. Then Roger's steam engine. I wonder do boys ever outgrow steam engines?"
"I promised Johnnie one," said Tavia before she could repress the exclamation. But the next instant she realized her mistake in mentioning home things.
"Then we will get them both alike," said Dorothy, all enthusiasm. "The boys are both the same age, and what one would like the other would love. Oh, isn't it just splendid to have little brothers to get toys for? After all, the toys are the best part of Christmas."
Tavia wanted to speak then—it was the time to tell Dorothy, the very opportunity for confessing the whole miserable affair. But what would Dorothy think? She never made such blunders, if it might be called by so charitable a name. And Dorothy had always warned her against writing letters to strangers. Oh, if she had only taken that advice! If she had only been satisfied with that sacred five dollars, money so dearly saved by her good mother! How many things that mother might have bought for herself, for Johnnie, or for Tavia's father, Squire Travers, with that fresh, clean five-dollar bill! But with what a world of love the indulgent mother had, instead, placed the note in Tavia's hand, with the remark:
"Now my little girl will have her own Christmas money. Now my daughter will be as good as any one else."
"Oh, mother!" thought Tavia now, as she tried to summon courage to confide in Dorothy. "If I only could be 'as good as other people,' as good as Dorothy, and as—honorable!"
"Excuse me, miss," spoke the strange little woman in black, leaning over to Tavia's seat, "but you dropped a paper."
"Thank you," replied Tavia as she hurried to secure an envelope that had flurried to the floor from the depths of her muff.
"What was it?" asked Dorothy innocently, as Tavia hid the envelope again.
"Oh, just a letter," replied the other, avoiding Dorothy's glance. "I thought I had destroyed it."
Attaching no significance to the remark, although Tavia turned about uneasily, Dorothy put away her shopping notes, and as the train slacked up under the great iron sheds of the city depot the girls made their way through the crowds, out into the wintry day, along the broad pavements, where the shop windows beamed in all their splendor of holiday goods and Christmas finery.
"Be careful of your purse," cautioned Dorothy, making her own secure within her squirrel muff.
"Oh, yes," replied Tavia with some impatience. It did seem as if Dorothy thought of nothing but purses and money.
"We will have to be careful, too, where we buy," persisted Dorothy, "else our money will scarcely go around."
Again Tavia felt annoyed. Was it because Dorothy had shared her money with her that she made such a fuss about it?
"We must get the boys' things first," went on Dorothy. "The little fellows must have their steam engines."
Then the face of her little brother Johnnie seemed to come before Tavia's bewildered eyes. How he beamed when she promised him that engine! And how fondly he kissed her when she declared it would make real steam! But she had her own five dollars at that time. That was before she had made—the mistake.
"I wish I had had a chance to caution Nat," thought the girl, as Dorothy made her way into the big department store. "I will have to tell him, first thing when I get back. But what ever will he think of me?"
"Tavia! Tavia!" called Dorothy, who by this time was scanning the mechanical toys on the great center tables. "Why don't you come and see? We will be crowded away from the best things if you don't hurry."
"There's the little woman who was on the train with us," replied Tavia, making her way to the clear spot Dorothy was saving for her. She must be sightseeing."
"She hardly looks well enough off to be buying mechanical toys," agreed Dorothy. "But Christmas goods seem to attract every one. See, isn't this cute?" and she held up a small tin automobile, the details of which revealed to what a nicety the real machine could be made in miniature.
"I do believe she is following us," whispered Tavia without regarding Dorothy's remark. "Let us get out of the crowd."