Oh, how I longed to be grown, to have opportunities to talk with those of the party who were considered old enough to remember facts, and would answer the questions I wanted to ask; and how firmly I resolved that when I grew to be a woman I would tell the story of my party so clearly that no one could doubt its truth!
CHAPTER XXVI
THANK OFFERINGS—MISS DOTY'S SCHOOL—THE BOND OF KINDRED—IN JACKET AND TROUSERS—CHUM CHARLIE.
Grandma had a fixed price for table board, but would not take pay for medicines, nor for attendance on the sick; consequently, many of her patients, after reaching San Francisco, sent thank offerings of articles useful and pleasing to her. Thus, also, Sister Georgia and I came into possession of pretty calico, Swiss, and delaine dresses, and shoes that filled our hearts with pride, for they were of Morocco leather, a red and a green pair for each. We had seen finely dressed Spanish children wear such shoes, but never supposed that we should be so favored.
After the first dresses were finished, there came a Sunday when I was allowed to go to the [Mission Church] with Kitty Purcell, the baker's little daughter, and I felt wonderfully fine in my pink calico frock, flecked with a bird's-eye of white, a sun-bonnet to match, and green shoes.
The brilliantly lighted altar, decked with flowers, the priests in gorgeous vestments, the acolyte with the swinging censer, and the intoned service in foreign tongue, were bewildering to me. My eyes wandered from the clergy to the benches upon which sat the rich and the great, then back to the poor, among whom I was kneeling. Each humble worshipper had spread a bright-bordered handkerchief upon the bare floor as a kneeling mat. I observed the striking effect, then recollecting my shoes, put my hand back and drew up the hem of my dress, that my two green beauties might be seen by the children behind me. No seven-year-old child ever enjoyed finery more than I did those little shoes.
Gifts which grandma considered quite unsuitable came one day in two neat wooden boxes about thirty inches in length, and eight in width and depth. They were addressed to us individually, but in grandma's care. When she removed the cover and a layer of cotton batting from Georgia's, a beautiful French lady-doll was revealed, exquisitely dressed, with a spray of flowers in her hair, and another that looped one side of her lovely pink skirt sufficiently high to display an elaborately trimmed petticoat. She was so fine in lace and ribbons, yes, even watch and chain, that grandma was loath to let us touch her, and insisted she should be handled in the box.
My gift was a pretty young Swiss matron in holiday attire, really more picturesque, and quite as costly as Georgia's, but lacking that daintiness which made the lady-doll untouchable. I had her to hug and look at only a few moments; then both boxes with their precious contents were put away for safe keeping, and brought forth only on state occasions, for the inspection of special visitors.