Peggy had thought that with so many other girls, about twenty in all, Betty might not like to have the surprise party talked over; or it might be that some one would feel hurt at not having been included in the sudden affair. For these reasons she was quite willing to have the subject changed.
“Wouldn’t this be a delicious night to go sledding, girls?” she asked, looking out from the large window near which she sat toward the broad expanse of snow that covered the lawn and stretched beyond the clumps of bushes and trees over the spacious grounds.
“Too soft, I’m afraid, Peggy,” said Mary Emma Howland. “It didn’t melt, though, when the sun came out. I wonder if it would pack and make enough. The wind had swept the ground pretty bare at our house, but hasn’t out here.”
“Perhaps it didn’t snow everywhere alike,” brightly suggested Kathryn Allen. “Sometimes it rains out in our suburb when my father says there isn’t a particle of rain down town.”
“The paper says that there is a blizzard out West,” said Carolyn. “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we did have sledding, next week anyhow?”
Betty explained to Janet and Sue what she had mentioned before, that the winters were considerably more mild here than their own and that everybody rejoiced when there were winter sports, making the most of them; but none of the three thought of any particular good time as on its way to them because of this unexpected snow. Soon came the pretty refreshments, when all the girls laid aside their work to enjoy them.
They were asked to go into another room, apparently a breakfast room, or a dining room on a small scale, Betty thought, where a round table was set for them. There a tiny turkey, which was a container for candy or nuts, stood at each place, connected with the central lights overhead by a gay ribbon. Betty’s place card bore an Indian on snowshoes, a wild turkey over one shoulder and a bow in one hand.
“I ’spect there’s some turkey in this ‘chicken salad,’ don’t you, Betty?” said Janet next to her.
“Carolyn always has such lovely things,” replied Betty, though she had been entertained there but once before. But this was perfect for an “afternoon tea.” Instead of tea they drank cocoa, however, and last they were served to tiny ice-cream roses and delicious little cakes with pink, white or chocolate frosting.
“I’ve done nothing but eat good things since I came to this city,” Sue declared after they came home, “and we’ve had enough different kinds of fun to last all winter! No, thank you, Mrs. Lee, I don’t believe we can eat a speck of supper, or dinner, whichever you call it here.”