Ruth Warren yielded to the entreaty in four pairs of eyes: “Yes, you may come at three o’clock for an hour’s meeting, if you like, and we will have all the things ready to take to the Convalescent Home the next morning.”
“I will bring Jerry, Christmas morning, Jerry and the double-seated sleigh, to carry you and the presents out there,” offered Ben.
“If any of you have any presents that you want to hang on the Christmas-tree for any of the rest of you,” said Elsa, diffidently, yet feeling that it was something which ought to be said, “you could bring them to my house and I am sure grandmother would take care of them for you.” Elsa’s few moment’s talk with her grandmother had made her feel that she could promise anything in her grandmother’s name for Christmas day.
Ruth Warren seated herself in front of the fire for a moment’s thought, after this lively meeting of the Club. She was greatly puzzled by Mrs. Danforth’s excited manner and her unexpected invitation for Christmas afternoon; and she was deeply interested to see how a little happiness had changed Elsa almost instantly into a light-hearted child like Betty and Alice. She had decided not to tell Elsa, beforehand, that Bettina March was coming to be with her Aunt Virginia, as the day of the nurse’s arrival was uncertain, although it would probably be Christmas day.
Her thinking was interrupted by the appearance of Sarah Judd, who came to take away the plate, which had been entirely emptied of plum buns.
“I don’t wonder you’re all tuckered out,” said Sarah severely, finding her young mistress sitting quietly in front of the fire; “such lively children, chatterin’ like magpies,—cunnin’ little things, though, they be,” she added with one of her sudden changes of tone.
Sarah brushed the crumbs from the table into the plate. Then, because she was so interested in the subject that she could not keep silent about it another moment, she said: “Beggin’ your pardon, Miss Ruth, but did you notice how like Mrs. Danforth’s that little twin girl’s eyes and forehead are,—a sight more than her own grandchild’s?”
“Sarah, you are just imagining that,” replied Ruth Warren. “You could only have seen them together for a moment.”
“That was long enough,” said Sarah, who did not think it necessary to explain that she had stood in the hall for several moments. “Folks can’t very often fool me on looks.” Sarah nodded her head and set the curls to bobbing as she repeated, “Folks can’t very often fool me on looks. The little girl is a sight like the old lady Danforth, but the boy is the very living image of her!”