This was the first allusion that had been made in Primrose Court to Maida’s lameness. Her face shadowed a little. “No, I’m afraid I couldn’t,” she said regretfully. “But—oh—think what a lovely dancer Rosie would make.”
“I’m afraid Rosie’s too rough,” Laura said. She unfolded a little fan and began fanning herself languidly. “It’s a great bother sometimes,” she went on in a bored tone of voice. “Everybody is always asking me to dance at their parties. I danced at a beautiful May party last year. Did you ever see a May-pole?”
“Oh, yes,” Maida said. “My birthday comes on May Day and last year father gave me a party. He had a May-pole set up on the lawn and all the children danced about it.”
“My birthday comes in the summer, too. I always have a party on our place in Marblehead,” Laura said. “I had fifty children at my party last year. How many did you have?”
“We sent out over five hundred invitations, I believe. But not quite four hundred accepted.”
“Four hundred,” Laura repeated. “Goodness, what could so many children do?”
“Oh, there were all sorts of things for them to do,” Maida answered. “There was archery and diabolo and croquet and fishing-ponds and a merry-go-round and Punch and Judy on the lawn and a play in my little theater—I can’t remember everything.”
Laura’s eyes had grown very big. “Didn’t you have a perfectly splendiferous time?” she asked.
“No, not particularly,” Maida said. “Not half such a good time as I’ve had playing in Primrose Court. I wasn’t very well and then, somehow, I didn’t care for those children the way I care for Dicky and Rosie and the court children.”
“Goodness!” was all Laura could say for a moment. But finally she added, “I don’t believe that, Maida!”