“And meanwhile,” laughed Madeline, “you can live in hope. The soup is ready. Betty, will you bring the bouillon cups? They’re tea-cups at present, and you’d better dust them off.”
The soup was delicious; so were the “inky drippers.” Katherine’s prejudices went down after the first taste. When the last morsel of meadow-mushroom had been disposed of, she heaved a deep sigh and voiced the sentiments of the whole party.
“Well, of course I hope these aren’t the Nero brand, but if I am ever poisoned I want the stuff that does it to taste as good as this.”
“And now,” said Mary briskly, “while we are waiting to find out about that, I think we’d better have a business meeting of ‘The Merry Hearts.’ I don’t know of any business myself, and I don’t see how we can transact any, with our peculiar rules and regulations; but Madeline and Roberta have been casting base insinuations on my fitness for the exalted office I hold, and I am going to show them how beautifully I could have presided over the Congress of these United States, if I’d only been a man.”
“We’re waiting to see you do it,” said Madeline placidly. “I haven’t written a report, and nobody can make a motion, but if you’ll please recognize me, Madame President——”
“Is it against the rules to give me a chance to call the meeting to order first?” inquired Mary with great dignity. “Now, Miss Ayres, if ‘The Merry Hearts’ will please come to order, you may have the floor.”
“All right,” said Madeline. “I’m in no hurry at all, only I wanted to ask the girls how they feel about taking in some new members,—or one new member at least.”
There was a dead silence. Each of “The Merry Hearts” thought instantly of Eleanor Watson, the only one of the Chapin House crowd who was not a member of the club. Though few of them knew the whole story of her sophomore year, they all understood the opposition of the B’s and Nita, and wondered why Madeline should care to defy it. Katherine Kittredge went a step further than the rest in her conjectures. Remembering how Betty had stood by Eleanor and how eager she was for the rest of the clan to know and like her too, she decided instantly that Betty, having won Madeline to her view, had persuaded her to suggest Eleanor for membership. She looked at Betty and utterly misinterpreted her distressed expression. For Betty, like the rest, thought that Madeline meant to propose Eleanor and was sure that her doing so just then was mistaken kindness. Katherine’s championship of Eleanor hitherto had been on Betty’s account, and now it was for Betty’s sake that she broke the hostile silence.
“Is there a rule against discussions, Mary?” she began, with an attempt at ease and hilarity. “I suppose we are all waiting because we are afraid you will call us down with one of your grand regulations. But seriously, Madeline, I’m sure this silence doesn’t mean opposition to your idea. It merely indicates deep thought. You see we are so fond of one another, and we feel so complete and nicely fixed just as we are, that we can’t grasp your point. Tell as why you think we need a new member.”
“Well,” said Madeline, smiling reassuringly at Betty, who still looked greatly troubled, “I don’t know that we exactly need any more members than we have. It’s quite obvious that, if we’re to meet here and in Betty’s room, we can’t enlarge our boundaries very much. But of course there are some awfully jolly girls at Harding who aren’t in this crowd. There was, for example, me,—before you took me in.”