"One can't have company without taking some trouble," she said at last. "But I wonder if one need take so much?"
"I don't see what else I could have done," said Milly. "You must give people nice things when they come to see you, and somebody has got to make them. And besides that, there is so much to see to about the house,—dusting, and washing china, and making the rooms nice."
"I know," went on Janet reflectively. "Mrs. Beers half killed herself, I remember, when she had that quilting two years ago, in giving the whole house a thorough house-cleaning beforehand. She said as like as not somebody would want to run up into the garret-chamber after something, and she should have a fit if it wasn't in order. And after all, not a soul went anywhere except to the parlor and dining-room, and into Mrs. Beers's bedroom to take off their things; so the fuss was all thrown away, and Mrs. Beers had inflammation of the lungs afterward, and almost died."
"I recollect. But then they might have gone to the attic—she couldn't tell. It was natural that Mrs. Beers should think of it."
"Well, and suppose they had, and that there had been a trifle of dust on the top of some old trunk, what difference would it have made? People who are busy enjoying themselves don't stop to notice every little thing. I am going to think the thing over, Milly. It's all wrong somehow."
Janet herself was meditating a party. Her father had given permission, and Aunt Esther, who managed the housekeeping, was only too glad to fall in with any plan which pleased Janet. Judge Norcross was the richest man on the Hill. There was no reason why Janet's entertainment should not out-shine Milly's. In fact, she had felt a little ambitious to have it do so, and had made certain plans in her private mind all of which involved labor and trouble; but now she hesitated.
"If I'm going to be as tired out as Milly was, and not enjoy it, what's the use of having a party at all?" she said to herself. "I'd like to have it as nice as hers; but whatever I have, I have got to do it all myself. I'm not as strong as Milly, I know, and it has half killed her; perhaps it would quite kill me. A party isn't worth that!"
She discussed the matter within herself, reasonably. She could wind herself up and make eight kinds of cake if she liked. There were the recipes and the materials and she knew how; moreover, Aunt Esther would help her. She could have as much jelly and syllabub and blanc-mange as Milly, she could turn the house upside down if she desired, and trim and beautify and adorn. It was a temptation. No girl likes to be outdone, least of all by her intimate friend. "But is it worth while?" Janet queried. And I think she proved herself possessed of a very "level head" when, at last, she decided that it was not.
"I'll be sensible for once," she told herself. "A party is not a duty, it is a pleasure. If I get so tired that I spoil my own pleasure, I spoil my company's too, for they will be sure to find it out just as they did at Milly's. I couldn't half enjoy anything that night, because she looked so miserable; and I won't run the risk of having the same thing happen at our house. I'll just do what is necessary, and leave off the extras."
The "necessary," when Janet came to analyze it, proved to be quite as much as she was able to undertake; for, as she had admitted to herself, she was not nearly so strong as Milly Grace. It meant an ample supply of two sorts of cake, freshly made and delicate, with plenty of ice-cream, salad, scalloped oysters, and rolls. There was extra china to wash, the table to set, and the rooms to dust and arrange, and Janet was quite tired enough before it was done. She sent to Boston for some preserved ginger to take the place of the jelly which she didn't make, she made no attempt at evergreen wreaths, and she wisely concluded that rooms in their usual state of cleanliness would pass muster with young people intent on dancing and amusement, that no one would find time to peep into holes and corners, and that the house could wait to have its "thorough cleaning" administered gradually after the occasion was over.