"No such thing," returned Polly. "Molly shall keep house, and I'll board with her. I hope my man will be proprietor of a restaurant, though," she added, in an aside to Alan.
Suddenly there came a wail from Jessie.
"Girls, girls! Just look at mine!"
"Where are they?" asked Molly.
"Here." And Jessie pointed tragically to one side of the tub, where the blue candle lay at the bottom of the sea, and the pink one, though still floating above it, had burned out and tilted to one side in an attitude of profound dejection.
"'Where was Moses when the light went out?
Where was Moses, what was he about?'"
sang Alan teasingly.
But even while he was singing, an energetic wave from Jean's side overturned his own small ships and left them floating bottom upwards.
"Just my luck!" he remarked, as he rose. "I knew I should come to some untimely end. As Poll says, I don't believe in signs, anyway."
The chocolate and wafers had been passed, and the fateful loaf of cake had been cut, bringing the ring to Florence, and the thimble, fitting symbol of single blessedness, to Jean; and still there was time for a little more of the fun. Some one suggested a game of forfeits, and a pile of them was soon collected, to be held over the head of Jessie who was chosen judge, as being the youngest girl present. Her ingenuity was endless, and she kept them laughing over her ridiculous fines, until nearly all had been redeemed.