“Of course not,” Madeline promised, with a very solemn, responsible air. “Come on, Babbie. Oh, I say, is that Polly Eastman going into the bookstore?”
“Not at all likely,” laughed Babbie, rushing off. “I never knew Polly to buy a book.”
The pursuit of Polly ended all serious business for that morning. It transpired that she had just been elected a member of the senior play committee, and she had resolved to buy a set of Shakespeare in honor of the occasion. First Babbie and Madeline must help her choose the books, then they must explain themselves, and as that was “such a long story,” they all retired to Holmes’s to talk it over and have ices. Then Polly had to hurry back for a noon recitation, and it would be a shame not to rush up to the campus with her and say hello to Georgia Ames. And Georgia, who also had a twelve o’clock class, begged them, with tears in her big brown eyes, to hang around till one, and then have “eats” with her down-town. So Madeline wrote a note to Mary, who would be relieved not to have so many people to lunch, and bribed a freshman friend of Georgia’s to deliver it on her way home. And she and Babbie sat on the steps of College Hall in the warm October sunshine, surrounded by a crowd of friends, old and new, to all of whom Madeline confided, under the strictest pledges of secrecy and with much delightful mystery as to where and when and by whom, the fact that a new and particularly “stunty” tea-shop was to be started right away in Harding.
“I should make my fortune as an advance advertising agent,” she told Babbie complacently, as they hurried up to Mary’s after lunch. “Getting everybody properly excited is awfully important, but I’m afraid Betty won’t appreciate that, and will think we ought to have found a place. Did you happen to notice any that would do?”
Babbie considered. “Why, any place down on Main Street would do well enough, I should think, but they’re all full, aren’t they? I don’t suppose any store would move out to let us in.”
“There must have been some vacant places that we didn’t notice,” said Madeline cheerfully. “We’ll just tell Betty that we think she ought to choose, as long as she’s going to run it. That will throw the responsibility on her.”
“I don’t see how it will find us a place, though,” said Babbie gloomily. “And we’ve forgotten the water-color paper for Mary’s place-cards.”
Mary embraced her guests almost tearfully when, the dinner-party having taken its staid departure, the cook and her assistants returned to the “realms of day,” as Madeline poetically designated the library.
“I had awful times explaining,” Mary told them. “They pricked up their ears at the place-cards. The soup got them seriously interested, and the salad positively went to their heads. I muttered something about a new cook, and I could see every woman at the table privately resolving to get her away from me forthwith.” Mary chuckled. “When you get ready to establish a catering branch, I’ll write you a screaming advertisement like this:
“Remember Mrs. Hinsdale’s Dinner and how
Envious it made you
And Patronize her Caterers, Betty Wales & Co.”