Away went Jack to consult Cousin Susy.
He found her very much occupied with her dressmaking, for she made new gowns and capes for all the ladies in town, and she was finishing up Miss Kitty Hardy's wedding outfit. With her mouth full of pins, Cousin Susy could not talk, but her brown eyes beamed on Jack as she listened to his plan. At last she took all the pins out of her mouth, and said:
"Leave it all to me, Jack. We'll give her a surprise party; I'll see about everything, dear. Whom shall we ask?"
"When thou makest a dinner or a supper," said Jack, repeating his golden text of the last Sunday's lesson, "call not thy friends, nor thy kinsmen, nor thy rich neighbors, lest they also bid thee again and a recompense be made thee. But when thou makest a feast, call the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and thou shalt be blessed, for they cannot recompense thee."
"Jack! Jack! Jack!" exclaimed Cousin Susy.
"I was only repeating my last golden text," answered Jack. "We don't often have to give a feast, and as it was so extraordinary," said Jack, saying the big word impressively, "I thought of my verse. I suppose we'd better ask the people mother likes, and they are the poor, the halt, the blind, and the deaf; for we haven't any rich neighbors, nor any kinsmen, except you, dear Cousin Susy."
"Well, I'm a kinswoman and a neighbor, dear, but I'm not rich. Now, let me see," said Miss Susy, smoothing out the shining white folds of Kitty Hardy's train. "We will send notes, and you must write them. There is old Ralph, the peddler, who is too deaf to hear if you shout at him ever and ever so much, but he'll enjoy seeing a good time; and we'll have Florrie Maynard, with her crutches and her banjo, and she'll have a happy time and sing for us; and Mrs. Maloney, the laundress, with her blind Patsy. I don't see Jackie, but you'll have a Scripture party after all. Run along and write your letters, and to-night we'll trot around and deliver them."
This was the letter Jack wrote:
"Dear Friend:—My mother's going to have a birthday next Saturday night, and she'll be thirty-six years old. That's pretty old. So I'm going to give her a surprise birthday party, and Cousin Susy's helping me with the surprise. Please come and help too, at eight o'clock sharp.
"Yours truly,