"I don't mind it as much on my face as my neck," declared Dee. "It feels like a great boa constrictor throttling me, but it would never do to have my face as fair as a lily and my neck as red as a rose."
The air was fresh and soothing and we were tired anyhow; our masks were not conducive to conversation, so one by one we dropped off to sleep while the dough was getting in its perfect work. We slept for hours I think, and while the dough was busy, the yeast was not idle but responded readily to the warmth occasioned by our poor faces. The air-holes, seemingly too large in the beginning, gradually began to close in as the little leaven leavened the whole lump. Lying on your back is sure to make you snore at any rate, and lying on your back with almost all air cut off from you will cause stertorious breathing fearful to hear.
I do not know how long we had been lying there, but I know I was having a terrible dream. I dreamed I was under water, and the water was hot. I was trying to get to the top, knowing I could float if I could only get to the top, but every time I would come to the surface Mabel Binks would sit on my face and down I would sink again. I was struggling and clutching wildly at the air and trying to call Zebedee, and then Zebedee pulled Mabel off me and I floated into the pure air. Incidentally I opened my eyes to find the real Zebedee bending over me simply convulsed with laughter, while Miss Cox pulled the mask off of Mary, who was making a noise like a little tug trying to get a great steamer out of harbour. Dum and Dee were sitting up rubbing their eyes and Annie was blinking at the light and wondering where she was and what it was all about.
"Well, it is a good thing we came home when we did or our whole house party would have broken up in asphyxiation. When we opened the door down stairs there was no sign of Blanche, but such noise as was issuing from this sleeping porch! Sawing gourds was sweet music compared to it What on earth do you mean by this peculiar performance?" and Zebedee burst out into renewed peals of laughter and Miss Cox sank helpless on the foot of my cot.
"If you could have seen yourselves!" she gasped. "Five girls in kimonos, lying prone, and each one, in the place of a head, sporting a great dumpling."
We looked woefully at our prized masks and to be sure each one had risen to three times its original bulk. Little wonder breathing had been difficult.
Dee still had the remedy around her neck, puffed out like an enormous goitre, her chin resting comfortably on it. All of us felt as foolish as we looked and that was saying a good deal.
"You certainly smell like a dairy lunch up here," sniffed Zebedee. "Please tell me if you were assisting poor, dear Blanche and raising her dough for her. Is this the method you housekeepers have employed all summer to have such good bread? I wondered how you did it. But don't I smell buttermilk, too?" We knew we were in for a good teasing and we got it, although Miss Cox did her best to make Zebedee call a halt. "Is all of this beautifying for the benefit of Harvie and Shorty, who by the way are coming out in about an hour? I feel sad that you did not think I was worth making yourselves pretty for, but maybe you knew that I like freckles. If you did, I feel sadder than ever that you should have taken away what I consider so charming."
I don't believe one single freckle was removed by our torture; but our skin felt soft and satiny, and Dum's peelings all came off with her mask. Then the long sleep had rested all of us so, after all, there was no harm done except that all the flour was used up. That night we had no bread but batter bread for supper, but since Blanche had mastered the mixing of that dish, dear to the heart of all Virginians, we none of us minded, just so she made enough of it, which she did.