Mrs. Peabody came back with two cracked china cups and saucers, and a tea kettle half full of passably hot water. Betty forgot her throbbing head as she bustled about, spreading white paper napkins on the bed—there was no table and only one chair in the room—and arranging her crackers and a package of saltines which she deftly spread with potted ham.
"We'll have a make-believe party," she declared tactfully, dropping a couple of soup cubes in each cup and adding the hot water. "I'm sure you're hungry; you jump up so much at the table, you don't half eat your meals."
Mrs. Peabody raised her eyes—faded eyes but still honest.
"I've no more pride left," she said quietly.
"Goodness!" exclaimed Betty, "I bought you something this morning, and haven't given it to you."
Mrs. Peabody was as pleased as a child with the pretty bottle of toilet water, and Betty extracted a promise from her that she would use it for her headaches, and not "save" it.
"If I was going to stay," thought Betty, stowing her packages of goodies under the bed as the most convenient place presenting itself, "I might be able to make things a little pleasanter for Mrs. Peabody. I do wonder when Uncle Dick will write."
She had allowed four days as the shortest time in which her uncle could possibly get an answer to her, so she was agreeably delighted when, on going out to the mailbox at the head of the lane the third morning, she found a letter addressed to her and postmarked "Philadelphia." There was no other mail in the box. The Peabodys did not even subscribe for a weekly paper.