“And what the Mater says, goes,” he had written to Beth. “She’s been awfully good to me—especially since I came home from the law school. Why! I never could have afforded such a fancy office if it hadn’t been for her. She’s bribed me to take this trip; but I don’t really see how the local bar is going to get along without me for a fortnight or three weeks.”
Nevertheless, Beth felt distinctly disappointed that Larry was not in Hudsonvale. There was something lacking in her holiday.
She had but one other source of worriment. And that she was not sure should be a worriment.
She noticed that her father was thinner, grayer, and that his walk seemed to have less springiness. She asked him if he did not feel well, and he laughed at her. Yet the laugh was not convincing.
She would not whisper to her mother or to the other children her fears for him. Mr. Baldwin had always been a thin and wiry man—one of the kind, as he often said, that wears out, but does not rust out.
The holidays, however, were gay. Besides a party given for her young friends by her mother on Christmas Eve, Beth went to the usual midwinter ball at the Town House—a very popular affair, indeed. She wore the poplin, and she danced many times with the men and boys who remembered her from the night of Larry Haven’s “coming out” party.
There was one little thing that, strangely enough, rather marred Beth’s enjoyment of the evening. She had never put on her pretty frock at Rivercliff without wishing that she had her Great-grandmother Lomis’ corals to wear; and now she suggested to her mother that she be given a second chance to display her heirloom.
Mrs. Baldwin suddenly looked troubled—exceedingly troubled. Hesitatingly, she said: “My daughter, I do not think it would be wise. You are really too young to wear such things yet. It caused, I believe, some comment before.”
Beth laughed. She would not show her mother how deeply she was disappointed. “I guess it’s because Mrs. Haven or Larry will not be there, isn’t it? You wanted to show me off before them. Now confess, Mother mine!”
Her mother seemed unable to laugh at this pleasantry. But Beth cheerfully put Larry’s present into the lace at her bosom and went to the ball. No taxicab this time, although there was snow on the ground. She carried her slippers, like most Hudsonvale people, under her arm.