“Perhaps I can stand behind a tree,” offered Sallie. “Or I might burrow down in the tall grass and not be noticed. Of course I’d sing better if my clothes were all right; but I’ll just try not to think about them.”
The next day, some of the girls sat on a bench in the shady grove and talked this weighty matter over.
“It’s a shame,” said Jean. “Sallie’s such a dear girl—one of the very sweetest girls in this school, I think, and she has a lovely voice. She ought to be able to stand right in the front row and be seen as well as heard.”
“It isn’t right,” said Bettie, “for all the rest of us to be all dressed up and having a good time when Sallie can’t—just because she’s a boarding school orphan.”
“Sometimes I’ve offered to lend her things,” said Jean, “but she doesn’t like it. I think it hurts her pride or something.”
“I thought we might write home for money,” said Marjory, “and get her a dress that way; but I’m sure Aunty Jane wouldn’t give me a cent for it. She might, after a long, long time—if I’d begun to tease for it last September, for instance, she’d begin about now to loosen up a little.”
“And my folks are too far away,” mourned Mabel, “so they’re no good.”
“And mine,” said Jean, “have to spend more on me now than they can afford.”
“And of course,” added Bettie, “the best my folks could do would be something out of a missionary box—something made of outing flannel most likely. Those boxes do run just awfully to outing flannel. Of course there’s Mr. Black—but I wouldn’t like to ask him.”
“No,” agreed Jean, “it wouldn’t be right. Of course, if we’d started soon enough and saved all our weekly spending money—”