"If they keep awake to the end," she thought, "that will be a good test. I'll know then that it has real interest and I'll not be afraid to give it to the public." So she kept an anxious watch out of the corner of her eye, intending to stop at the first sign of weariness. But the attention of her audience was as profound as it had been during the afternoon. Stifling an occasional yawn herself, she read on and on. It was half-past two when she laid aside the last page of her manuscript and looked up timidly to receive the verdict. Lloyd spoke first.
"Betty Lewis, it's perfectly splendid! I'm so proud of you—I've always been suah you'd make a name for yoahself some day, but I nevah dreamed you'd do it so early in life, at only twenty!"
"I haven't made it yet, you know," Betty reminded her smiling. "My friends may be willing to 'pass my imperfections by,' but I've still to run the gauntlet of the critics."
There was a chorus of protests from the other girls, and Betty's heart grew warm as she listened to their cordial praise and predictions of success.
"I'm dying to have a finger in the launching of this little bark," said Gay. "Let's wrap it up tonight and have it all ready to send off in the morning. It would be so fine to be able to brag to my grandchildren that I helped. I have a strong flat box just the size of the manuscript. I'm sure it will fit it exactly. Wait and I'll go and get it."
She ran out of the room, and, while she rummaged through a trunk to find it, Lucy climbed up on a chair to look on the wardrobe shelf for some heavy wrapping-paper which she had folded away.
"Let me have some part in it too," cried Kitty. "Although I've no idea what it can be when I'm so far from the source of supplies. Oh, I know now," she said after an instant's thought. "You'll need a string to tie around the box. Here's something that will do."
Opening the wicker satchel she had brought with her she took out a dainty nightgown. It was the work of only a moment to slip out the fresh, new pink ribbons that had been run through the lace beading.
"Now let me tie it!" she insisted. "See what an artistic bow I can make!"