"They will look very pretty on your dresser," smiled Mrs. Lee. "I know what you mean, Mother--that I'm just playing for the candlesticks alone and I'm not at all, for when I do win one I sort of hate taking a prize. But I would like to beat Carol because she does play such a good game!"
"That's the spirit, Bab. Where are the little girls?"
"That's what I wanted to talk to you about, Mother," Barbara, balancing herself on the arm of a chair, tapped her toe with the putter. "Peggy and Alice have gone off to Molly Sawyer's and they've left Keineth home. I don't think they're treating her a bit nicely!"
"Why didn't she go with them?"
"I don't think Peggy asked her to go. She and Molly were going to play tennis on the Sawyer courts with Joan Crate, a girl that's out here from town, and Keineth felt left out. Peggy told her she couldn't play well enough to play with them and that it spoiled a game playing with beginners, anyway!"
Mrs. Lee stitched in silence. Barbara went on:
"And I heard Billy the other day teasing her about her father. He laughed at her when she said her father was a soldier, only the kind that didn't wear a uniform, and he told her there weren't any soldiers like that! I think you ought to speak to the children, Mother."
"Never mind, Bab, those things will straighten themselves. Peggy must be more considerate and patient and I will tell Billy something about Keineth's father--Billy will be interested. We may some day have reason to be very proud of knowing him, for he may become a very great man, besides doing an immense good for this country of ours. Run along, dear, to your game and good luck to you!"
Barbara kissed the top of her head and hurried away. Mrs. Lee sat on alone, her hands idly clasped over the blouse in her lap. It was her way to puzzle out these little problems quietly.
Suddenly across the June stillness came the sound of exquisite music; clear, thrilling notes, unreal--fairylike! Almost hesitatingly Mrs. Lee turned as though she expected to see a fairy sprite in gauzy robes approaching her from the shadows of the house! She rose and crept toward the window. No sprite was there--only Keineth sitting before the piano, her small hands softly touching the keys as though by magic she drew the melody from them. Across her fair head fell a slanting bar of sunlight. To this her eyes were raised in rapt contentment.