“They are the best, then.”
“Of course they’re the best. As Dad says sometimes, ‘You can’t start an argument with me on that, Jean.’ The thing is—let’s see—‘self-evident’.”
But Molly enjoyed the fun as much as any of the rest and it began at once. Saturday’s meeting at the Dudley home was like another party, Fran said. Jean, who had felt so shy with Mrs. Dudley, was made to feel at home by her cordial way of meeting the girls.
“So you are the young lady who started this mysterious club, are you?” she asked. “Leigh will not confide the name, only the initials. If there is anything that I can do to help the fun along, let me know, Madam President!”
The bit of formality about Mrs. Dudley made her only the more “fascinating,” Jean confided to Nan later on; but the girls were taken at once to Leigh’s own room, where they exclaimed in little oh’s and ah’s over her pretty arrangements. “Papa let me plan it,” said Leigh, pleased that the girls liked her room. “When he built the house he told Mamma and me that we might as well have just exactly what we had always wanted. So as I had wanted certain things, I planned it out. Do you like my long window-seat?”
“It’s like a real living room, Leigh,” said Nan, “with your fireplace and mantel, and your built-in bookcases. I love the chaise longue! Here is the beautiful movie heroine, reclining in her boudoir!”—and Nan gracefully sank into the damask-covered arms of the article of furniture mentioned, arranging imaginary draperies over her feet.
“Don’t, Nan,” laughed Bess. “I’m growing hilarious now and Leigh’s mother will be shocked at our laughing so much, especially when the secretary reads the names the S. P.’s have been called.”
“Don’t worry about Mamma,” said Leigh. “She thinks that I have not had enough fun with the girls since I have been here; but you all were such old friends that I felt,—well, you know how a stranger would feel.”
“Especially a nice stranger like you,” warmly said Jean. “But you are one of us now.”
No more time was lost. The president with quite an air called the meeting to order, asking at once for the report of the secretary. Nan, still occupying the admired piece of furniture, languidly read her report, which was so funny that her hearers were convulsed. Nan had quite a gift as scribe. No funny detail of how the S. P.’s started was omitted. Shaking with repressed laughter, they felt that they could not miss a word and Jean’s voice shook as she said, “You have heard the report of the secretary,”—then she could not go on, and Molly moved that it be accepted.