"Especially if you work as hard as Marian and I do," put in Julia, laughing. Their marks for the month had come out unexpectedly a little higher than Anne's and Lucy's.
Marian looked pleased but said nothing. In fact she was having rather a hard time with the buttons, and Lucy secretly took the work away from her more than once to straighten out a snarl of cotton.
"Just think of never having even sewed on a button for yourself," Lucy thought as she bent again over her own hemming. With the reflection she understood a little better a certain helplessness about Marian that cropped out at inconvenient moments, when Lucy in the midst of some occupation needed a helping hand. It was not that Marian was clumsy or lacked quickness—she learned anything with amazing readiness—it was only that she had never done little useful things and had to learn what most girls know.
The two hours of work passed pleasantly and quickly, with every one sewing as hard as she could and talking still harder. When the clock struck half-past three a pile of finished garments had been stacked upon the table.
"Oh, isn't this nice?" said Mrs. Houston, folding the little flannel dresses with approving hands. "You've done more than I ever thought you could, girls, and you've certainly earned a rest."
"We liked doing it," said Mabel Philips, putting down her last piece of work. "We'll come any time you want us, if we can."
Every one hurried into her hat and coat and ran down-stairs. Outdoors a cold wind was blowing from Sandy Hook which flung capes and coats about in clinging folds, and made the sentry's ears red, as he walked in front of the club, shifting his gun occasionally from one shoulder to the other.
"Gracious!" said Marian, snuggling promptly down into her fur collar. "I'm glad Lucy can't take me for a walk to-day. This is the sort of weather she likes to go around the island just where the wind is strongest."
"Isn't she cruel?" said Anne Matthews, laughing. She did not add that Marian's rosier cheeks and growing endurance were a pretty good defense of Lucy's persevering methods.
Back at the Gordons', after the wraps were put aside, Lucy said to her guests: "I thought it would be fun to play games for a while. What do you think? You aren't any of you too old to like Blind Man's Buff and Stage-Coach and Winks, are you?"