James was listening now and inquired:
“What you raking up old times for, Dorothy? Inviting them south-siders that made such a lot of trouble when you lived ‘up-mounting’ afore your folks leased their farm?”
“Whose ‘Party’ is this?” asked the young hostess, calmly, yet with a twinkle in her eye.
“All of our’n,” answered Alfaretta, complacently.
“How many girls now, Alfy?” questioned Molly, who longed to suggest some of her schoolmates but didn’t like a similar reproof to that which fell so harmlessly from Alfaretta’s mind.
“Five,” said the secretary, counting upon her fingers. “Me, and you, and her, and——five. Correct.”
“Mabel Bruce.”
“Who’s she? I never heard of her,” wondered Molly, while Jim answered:
“She’s a girl ’way down in Baltimore. Why, Dorothy C., you know she can’t come here!”
“Why not? Listen, all of you. This is to be my House Party. It’s to be the very nicest ever was. One that everyone who is in it will never, never forget. My darling Aunt Betty gave me permission to ask anybody I chose and to do anything I wanted. She said I had learned some of the lessons of poverty and now I had to begin the harder ones of having more money than most girls have. She said that I mustn’t feel badly if the money brought me enemies and some folks got envious.”