Now, just at that very moment bells began ringing all over the house: the front-door bell, the side-door bell, the Chinese gongs, the little silver tea-bell clanged and jingled. What could it mean?
“More surprises!” laughed Adele. “Come along, girls; let’s fathom the mystery.”
So down the stairs the Sunny Seven trooped. Bob Angel stood in the lower hall, ringing a dinner-bell, as he chanted:
“Ding, dong, dell!
Hark to the bell—ll—ll!
Come, follow me,
And see what you will see!”
“Bob’s happy now,” his sister Bertha jokingly exclaimed. “Like all little boys, he loves to make a big noise.”
The girls trooped after the bell-ringer, and as they entered the library, the folding-doors slid silently open, and such a festive scene as they beheld in the room beyond!
A mahogany table was decked with shining silver and sparkling glass, and in the center was a frosted cake with thirteen candles ablaze. Pretty name-cards told each guest where to sit, and of course Adele was at the head of the table and Bob at the foot. Kate, with her kindly Irish face aglow, appeared in the kitchen doorway and then Mrs. Doring came in to help pass the good things.
“Two feasts in one day!” exclaimed Bob Angel. “I wish I had the capacity of Giant Blunderbuss of fairy lore.”
The first course soon disappeared, and then the cake, with its twinkling candles, was placed in front of Adele to be cut.
“Thirteen is going to be my lucky number hereafter,” Adele laughed, and then she puckered up her mouth and blew the lights out. “Oho, here’s a card on the cake,” she called gayly, and then she read aloud, “For my little Colleen, from Kate.”