It was a lovely birthday supper. Everyone said so. They had chicken sandwiches, and cocoa, and vanilla and strawberry ice-cream, and of course the birthday cake, which Brother cut in slices himself with the big silver cake knife.
"Why—look!" ejaculated Sister in surprise, glancing up from her cake at the doorway.
Mother Morrison stood there, smiling, and in her hands she carried what seemed to be a very large pudding or pie baked in a milk pan.
"What is it?" said Brother curiously. "What is it?"
"It's a secret," answered his mother mysteriously. "Grandmother Hastings planned it for you."
"And you and Louise bought part of it," Grandmother Hastings assured him, nodding and smiling from the other doorway, the one that led into the hall.
She had come over, in her prettiest white and lavender gown, to see the end of the party.
Mother Morrison came up to the table with the pie and the children saw that the paper crust was full of little slits and that from each slit a ribbon hung out. Some were blue and some were pink.
"Each girl must choose a blue ribbon," said Mother Morrison. "The pink ones are for the boys. You pull first, Lucy."
Lucy Reed pulled one of the blue ribbons. She hauled out a little celluloid doll dressed in a gay red frock.