“You have come to the right place for it, then, Mrs. Sterling,” said Aline, looking rather wistfully at Ann and her mother. Aline missed her mother more than she ever let any one know.
Ann had a faint idea of this and made sure that, after the meal was over, Aline, who had happened to be the one to greet Mrs. Sterling first, should accompany them from the table. They met Miss Tudor on the way out of the dining-room; rather, she joined them, and cordially welcomed Mrs. Sterling, who said that she would call to see her “tomorrow.”
“Good, Mother!” said Ann, after Miss Tudor had gone on with one of the teachers. “I was so afraid that we would have to waste to-night by calling.”
“Miss Tudor would not feel flattered if she heard that remark,” said Mrs. Sterling.
“I like Miss Tudor, but I can see her every day,” replied Ann. “Do you blame me, Aline?”
“Not a bit.”
The evening would not have been properly begun without music, but the girls passed by the parlors of the administration building and went on to their own building, where Aline secured her violin; and in the Castle’s drawing room, a dozen or more girls gathered around the piano, to sing for Mrs. Sterling, surprised and pleased to have her join in the Forest Hill songs and others. Then Aline, Katherine, Dorothy and Ann escorted her to Ann’s suite for a good visit before bedtime. Mrs. Sterling had not been a girl herself for nothing. In her bag was an immense box of candy and she promised the girls to call them in when another “Thanksgiving box” arrived. “I had to send it,” she said, “but it should be here in the morning at the latest.”
“What is it, Mother?” asked Ann.
“Wait and see, little Ann,” laughed her mother. “It is another surprise.”