“Yes, you will, Judy. You just must come out of those widow’s weeds for the house party,” Molly urged.
“No,” said Judy, “I’ve made a vow and until that vow is fulfilled I shall never wear colors. I’ve sent two dresses down to the Wellington Dye Works to be dyed black. Fortunately my suit is black already and so is my hat. Now, I have a proposition to make, Molly. I’m in need of funds more than clothes just now and I’ll sell you my yellow gauze for the contents of Martin Luther. He must be pretty full by now.”
“He’s plumb full,” answered Molly proudly. “I hadn’t realized how much I had put in until I tried to drop a quarter in this morning, and lo, and behold, he couldn’t accommodate another cent.”
She held up the china pig and shook him.
“How much should you think he’d hold altogether?” asked Judy. “I don’t want to be getting the best of the bargain and perhaps Martin Luther is worth more than the dress.”
“No, no,” protested Molly. “He could never be worth that much. I think he has about fifteen dollars in his tum-tum. I’ve put in all the money I earned from cloudbursts and about ten dollars, changed up small, for tutoring.”
Judy insisted on adding a blue silk blouse and a pair of yellow silk stockings to the collection to be sold.
“I’ll sell them to someone else if you won’t buy them,” she announced, “and if you need a dress, you might as well take this one off my hands.”
“Well,” Molly finally agreed, “we’ll break open Martin, and count the money and, if there’s anything like a decent sum, I’ll buy the dress. Let’s make a party of it,” she added brightly. “I’ll cut the hickory-nut cake that came from home last night, and Nance can make fudge.”
It was like Molly’s passion for entertaining to turn the breaking open of the china bank into a festival. Nance had once remarked it was one thing to have a convivial soul and quite another to have the ready provisions, and Molly never invited her friends to a bare board.