The day before Bess’s party Mrs. Schmitz surprised the boys with new suits, shoes, ties, and gloves, everything complete.
Max drew the soft handkerchief through his fingers caressingly. “What a satisfaction! Real linen once more.”
Sydney was pleased with his clothes but he did not know linen from cotton, nor the value of knowing. Yet when both boys were dressed and parading in front of their delighted house-mother, Sydney was fully as grateful, as much filled with a comfortable sense of being well dressed as was Max. And neither of them enjoyed their finery so much as the one who gave it to them.
The party was a success. Bess was a cordial, unaffected hostess; and her father and mother doubled her welcome because they were able to be young with young people.
Ida Jones was there. Any girl or woman would have known that her simple gown of rich creamy color cost little; a dressmaker would have known it was homemade, yet to Sydney it looked gorgeous; and the rose she wore in her hair, one that Bess begged to pin on after Ida arrived, held in its deep heart all the rich reddish yellows and yellow browns of her hair.
She looked so “dressed up,” so young lady-like, that Sydney was afraid of her; and with a hurried nod, passed her and stood aloof with one or two other young chaps, wearing their first evening clothes, cold with nervousness, thinking every eye upon them.
Bess spied them and came over, speaking to Sydney first. “Miss Jones will be your partner for the evening. You must see that she has a good time. May I depend on you, Mr. Bremmer?”
She was more than ever the Queen of Sheba tonight, a large, richly colored brunette with the mystery of the East looking from her dark eyes, but the strength and fearless generosity of the West heartening through all her cheery speech. Her dress of some soft, oriental stuff, simply made and worn with no ornament save a strand of curiously wrought eastern beads, emphasized and distinguished her from the over-dressed girls who were in the majority.
She, too, gave Sydney a shiver of strangeness. He did not notice that the young men also looked “different,” wore their “company” manners; and the “Mr. Bremmer” frightened him.
“I—I’ll try. What—how—you know—Say! This is awfully—”