“Who are those who have failed to be so formal as Bess requires?” asked Miss Jewett.
“Elizabeth Hollins, for one, but she and Bess have always been so intimate that there is no need for her to write. Bess has not mentioned her case, but did become quite miffed because Flo Harris only called across the street: ‘I’m coming, Bess.’ ‘That isn’t the way young ladies in the city would do,’ Bess said to me.”
“I think I can tell you why Elizabeth has not answered,” returned Miss Jewett; “she never received her invitation. I know her well enough to be sure that nothing would please her so much as to write a most formal and highly-flown note, and besides she told me herself on Christmas Day that she was not going to the party because she had not been invited.”
“Dear me,” returned Mrs. Ferguson; “that is most unfortunate. I would not hurt the dear child’s feelings for the world. I must see to the matter as soon as I get home.”
She lost no time in doing this but put the question to Bess almost as soon as she reached home. “Bess,” she said, “I have just heard that Elizabeth Hollins failed to get her invitation to your party. You must go out there this very afternoon and tell her, or, better still, I will write an invitation in proper form so she will not feel slighted. I don’t see how it happened that she did not get one. I am sure that she was not overlooked, for I looked over the envelopes myself before I put them in the basket.”
“Did you give it to Elizabeth herself?” asked Mrs. Lynde.
“No, grandmamma,” Bess replied. “I took it to the post-office. It was so late when we got through that Corinne said we’d better take it to the post-office.”
“As long as that was the furthest point you had to go you should have gone there first,” said Mrs. Lynde, “and have left the places nearer home till the last. It is too bad, but evidently it has gone astray.”
Bess said never a word though she was really relieved that Elizabeth would have her invitation after all. She would not say a word to Corinne about it, and when she came to the party and found Elizabeth there she would surely not go away.
But it happened that it was not Bess who took the invitation for she was in demand by the dressmaker that afternoon and could not be spared, so Mrs. Ferguson hastily wrote a note and ran in to see if Betsy would be so good as to take it with the invitation to Elizabeth. Would Betsy refuse? Of course not. She went on wings of joy and burst in upon Elizabeth in great excitement. “It’s here, it’s here,” she cried. “It was a mistake, after all. They did send it and you didn’t get it. Read the note.” She thrust the envelopes into Elizabeth’s hand and stood by panting from the haste with which she had come.