“Mother, if you want to ask him, I’ll take Sherm, and Ernest, too, while Dick and Alice are here. I’d rather have Sherm than Carol, and 37Mother said in her letter that the Dart’s were having a sad time this year. Mr. Dart has been ill for so long.”
Chicken Little had listened in tense silence to this conversation, but she couldn’t keep still any longer.
“You are going to ask Katy and Gertie, aren’t you, Mother?”
Mrs. Morton smiled but made no reply.
“You’ll have to go to work and help Mother if you want any favors, Jane,” her father admonished.
The following week apparently wrought an amazing change in Chicken Little. She let novels severely alone–even her precious set of Waverly beckoned in vain from the bookcase shelves. She waited upon her mother hand and foot. She set the table without being asked, and brought up the milk and butter from the spring house before Mrs. Morton was half ready for them. Indeed, she was so unnecessarily prompt that the butter was usually soft and messy before the meal was ready. She even practiced five minutes over the hour every day for good measure, conscientiously informing her mother each time.
“Bet you can’t hold out much longer, Sis,” scoffed Ernest, amused at her efforts to be virtuous. 38“You’re just doing it to coax Mother into inviting Katy and Gertie.”
“I just bet I can, Ernest Morton. Of course I want her to invite Katy and Gertie, but I’m no old cheat, I thank you, I’m going to help the best I can all summer if she asks ’em.”
“And if she doesn’t?”
“Don’t you dare hint such a thing–she’s going to–I think you’re real hateful! I just don’t care whether you get to go to college or not.”