“Oh, delicious!”
“But where is that great thing you were going to tell me?”
“Oh, I forgot. Well, when we got to school last Monday, there was Clara Adams and all the girls she could get together and they were whispering in a corner. They looked over at me and I knew they were talking about me, but I didn’t care. Then I went over to Dorothy and we just stayed by ourselves all the time, for those other girls didn’t seem to want to have anything to do with us. We hadn’t done one single thing to make them act so, but Clara Adams is so hateful and jealous and all that, she couldn’t bear to have us be liked by anybody. Dorothy told me she heard her say I was a pet and that was the reason I got along with my lessons. You know I study real hard, mother, and it isn’t that at all. Clara said it was just because Uncle Justus favored me, and told Miss Ashurst too. Wasn’t that mean?”
“I think it was rather mean, but you must not mind what a spoiled child like Clara says, as long as you know it isn’t so.”
“That’s what Agnes says. We told Agnes and Celia how the girls were doing and how they had a secret and didn’t want us to be in it, so Agnes said we could have a secret, too, and she has planned a beautiful one, she and Celia. I will tell you about it presently. Well, then Jennie Ramsey came.”
“Jennie Ramsey? I don’t think I ever heard you speak of her.”
“No, of course you didn’t, for I only just became acquainted with her. Mother, don’t you remember the lovely Mrs. Ramsey that did so much about getting Margaret into the Home of the Friendless?”
“I remember, now.”
“Well, she is Jennie’s mother, and she told Jennie to be sure to speak to me, because she knows Aunt Elizabeth, I suppose, but anyhow, she did. But first the Clara Adams set tried to get Jennie to go with them, but she just wouldn’t, and so she’s on our side. I know Clara is furious because the Ramseys are richer than the Adamses.”
“Oh dear, oh dear,” Mrs. Conway interrupted, “this doesn’t sound a bit like my little girl talking about one person being richer than another and about one little girl’s being furious about another’s making friends with whom she chooses.”