The girls were mightily impressed by this act until Nyoda talked it over with them and made them see that the gift was entirely inappropriate. So while they admired her to distraction and each one secretly hoped that Veronica would single her out as a special friend, they had to admit that as yet they had not made much headway.
“If Sahwah doesn’t come in five minutes, we’ll have to start without her,” said Hinpoha, walking impatiently to the window. “Carol practice begins at two and it’s half-past one now.”
Just then the telephone rang. “It’s Sahwah,” reported Hinpoha, upon answering, “and she says she’s got a real charity case for us to look into—some old woman—and she’s down at Sahwah’s house now and we should all come down. She says it’s the saddest thing she ever heard. What shall we do, girls, shall we go?”
“Of course,” said Katherine promptly.
“What about carol practice?” asked Gladys. “Won’t it make us dreadfully late?”
“We’ll just have to be late, then,” said Katherine, jabbing her hatpins in swiftly. “Come on.”
Sahwah met them at the door with an unusually solemn countenance. “You’re a load of bricks to come, girls,” she said, “but I knew you would. Come right upstairs. In here,” she said, pausing before the door of her room. “Maybe you’d better go in one at a time. You go first, Hinpoha.”
Hinpoha, feeling queer, passed in. The next minute those outside heard a great shout. “Migwan! My Migwan! When did you come? We thought you weren’t coming for two whole days yet. Sahwah, you wretch, how could you get us so worked up?”
The others burst in and smothered Migwan in embraces while Katherine stood looking on curiously, until Gladys remembered her manners. “This is our Katherine,” she said, drawing her forward, “that we have all written you about. Make a speech, Katherine, to show her how you do it!”
And Katherine obligingly complied and Migwan laughed extravagantly and was soon sitting on the bed beside her with her arm locked in hers, and talking to her as if she had known her all her life instead of only five minutes. That was the effect Katherine had on everybody.