Ruth Warren was keenly disappointed. She knew that her aunt could stay alone for an hour perfectly well; but she could not go with any pleasure now, after her aunt had asked her to stay at home.
When the merry sleighful stopped in front of the house, Ruth Warren herself answered the ring at the front door in order not to delay the party. Mr. Danforth had told Ben that he would call for Miss Warren and bring out the basket and boxes, so that Ben might stay in the sleigh and hold Jerry, who, Ben said, might feel extra lively on Christmas morning and run away with his precious load!
Accordingly, when Ruth Warren opened the door, there stood before her Elsa’s tall, broad-shouldered uncle with clear gray eyes, steady in an open, moustached face, who looked squarely at her while he said with almost a boy’s earnestness: “Merry Christmas, Miss Warren! Your Club is at the door. Are you and the Christmas presents ready to start for the Convalescents’ Home?”
“Here are the basket and boxes, Mr. Danforth,” she said, for she had them close by the door. Leaving him to bring them, she threw her red cape over her shoulders and ran down the steps to the curb-stone to tell the Club that she could not go with them on account of her Aunt Virginia.
A prolonged wail of grief went up from the Club.
“We can’t go without you!” cried Elsa, her violet-gray eyes filling with tears.
“Please, please come,” entreated Betty, jumping out of the sleigh. “I will go and ask your aunt to let you.”
“But it is I who decide it, not my aunt,” Ruth Warren said. “You will have Mr. Danforth with you, and the head-nurse expects you, and you are only to stay a short time. You will get along just as well without me.”
“But we want you!” wailed the Club. “It won’t be any fun without you;” and they would not be consoled.