"Why, I didn't have time, Aunt Lu. I—I just had to get up the real party right away, you see."
"Oh, yes, I see."
So Aunt Lu told Mary, her cook, and her other servants, to get ready for the party Sue had planned. For it would never do to have the big girl, and the little boys and girls, come all the way to Aunt Lu's house, and then not give them something to eat, especially after Sue had promised it to them.
Bunny and Sue could hardly wait for the next day to come, so eager were they to have the party. They were up early in the morning, and they wanted to help make the jam and jelly tarts, but Aunt Lu said Mary could better do that alone. Wopsie helped dust the rooms, though, and she lifted up to the mantel several pretty vases that had stood on low tables.
"Dem chilluns might not mean t' do it," said the little colored girl, "but dey might, accidental like, knock ober some vases an' smash 'em. Den Miss Lu would feel bad."
Bunny and Sue spoke to Henry, the elevator boy, about the ragged children coming to the party.
"You'll let them ride up with you; won't you, Henry?" asked Sue.
"Oh, suah I will!" he said, smiling and showing all his white teeth. "Dey kin ride in mah elevator as well as not."
And, about two o'clock, which was the hour Sue had told them, the ragged children came, the big girl marching on ahead with Aunt Lu's card held in her hand, so she would find the apartment house. But the children were not so ragged or dirty now. Their faces and hands were quite clean, and some of them had on better clothes.
"I made 'em slick up, all I could," said the big girl, who said her name was Maggie Walsh. "Is the party all ready?"