LYON “Y” AND A COUNTESS
The door stood a little ajar and Lucia, having difficulty in
stifling her sobs, suddenly rose and ran toward it, to close it, as
Betty guessed. Lucia had merely pushed it to before they had cuddled
down in the cushions. But as she grasped the ornate bronze handle,
the first notes of something beautiful sounded upon the piano below.
Lucia stopped, caught her breath as one does after crying, mopped
her eyes again and stood still to listen. After a sparkling prelude,
a voice began to sing.
Betty sat up at once. “Oh, that lovely voice, Lucia. Who is it?”
Betty had in mind the ladies who were around that dinner table. This
was a clear soprano voice, haunting and full of feeling as the song
went on.
Lucia turned and softly said, “My Mother.” She waited a few moments
and then ran into her bathroom to bathe her tear-stained face. But
Betty went over to the door to listen till the song was over. It was
nothing that she knew—some Italian song, but Betty felt an ache at
her heart. Who was this that could sing like that? Betty had seen
the countess in several different moods or phases—that of the
capable traveler, the efficient mother when Lucia came home after
her slight injury upon the hike, the pleasant, well-poised, gracious
hostess—now here was something else.
The song was finished. When Betty heard the voices in conversation
again, she closed the door and went back to where her books were,
looking over her lesson till Lucia came back. Lucia was smiling and
said that it was “all over.”
“I’m not going to be silly and cry again, Betty, but I shall
probably want to talk to you about this some more. Here are some of
my father’s letters. I keep them in my desk, you see. See how fat
they are? He tells me about the hunts and the going through that
queer country and everything that he thinks would interest me and
help me to learn about it. Sometimes he puts in little things that I
know he thinks my mother may read.”
Betty took in her hands a letter that Lucia handed her. It was, of
course, written in Italian and very “fat,” as Lucia said. “I don’t
think that you were silly to cry, Lucia. I don’t see how you can
help feeling as you do. Your father must be a very interesting man
and your mother is certainly a gifted woman.”
“Mother was studying music in Milan when she met my father, you
know.”
Some slight progress had been made in lessons, but the girls retired
earlier than Betty had supposed they would, for when the maid came
in after rapping, upon some little errand of Lucia’s clothing, Lucia
told her that she was tired and would go to bed very soon. Betty was
only too glad to do the same thing and the girls soon said
goodnight. In a comfortable bed, under white blankets and a silken
comforter, as Betty noticed, she soon fell to sleep. It _was_ nice
to have a maid fussing around to do things for you, to open your
window just the right amount, arranging a little screen of some
sort, to see that your clothing was placed properly. But maids
weren’t mothers!
Breakfast the girls had alone, as they rose earlier than either the
countess or Mr. Murchison. Lucia told Betty that it was unusually
early for her on a Saturday morning, but if they did “Christmas
shopping,” they were wise to have a good start, as the stores would
be full of people. Moreover, the countess herself would want the
chauffeur to drive her down later in the day.
“Mother will sleep till noon, I suppose,” said Lucia, “because I
think everybody stayed late last night. Uncle will drive his coupe
down town, and we can have Horace and the big car all morning.”
The plans for shopping were made. Betty informed Lucia that for a
president of Lyon “Y” she knew little about the usual plans for
Christmas, but that the committee had asked her to buy certain
things. Both girls had also personal shopping to do and it was like
shopping with a fairy godmother to go with Lucia. She insisted on
paying from her own purse for the materials Betty had been asked to
buy. She bought half a dozen more dolls because she thought them
“cute.” These were dressed. Betty still felt dubious about what the
committee would think, but after all wouldn’t some “kiddie” love
them!
It was a rather delirious morning for Betty. If she had not had a
list, she would have been too excited to think properly, she said.
When she told Lucia that the Lyon “Y” had adopted a family and
related the story of the Thanksgiving baskets, Lucia began to buy
toys “regardless,” Betty told her.
“Oh, let’s make them think old Santa just had a spill of toys from
his old sleigh!” said Lucia, as happy as Betty, looking into the
gayly decked windows, or descending into the store basements where
the toys were displayed.
Betty had “always” intended to go back to see what was the result
with the “Sevillas,” but there was so much to do at school with
lessons and tests and other duties and at home in preparation for
the holidays that she had not “had a minute” to spare, it seemed.
Her father was unusually busy, too; and when she spoke to him about
the coincidence of the names and referred to the odd parenthesis in
Ramon Balinsky’s letter, he had only said that it “might be well to
look into it.”
The crimson car was pretty well filled with packages when Lucia had
finished her shopping, for why should they wait to have things
delivered when they wanted to see them right away? And Lucia sent
the car home, telling Betty that her mother might want it and that
there was no use in keeping Horace waiting around while they had
lunch down town.
Betty assured Lucia that any arrangement was satisfactory to her, as
they entered a pretty tea room and lingered over their lunch,
ordered by Lucia after consultation with Betty. Chicken salad and
toothsome desserts figured largely in the order and Betty was sure
that she would want nothing that afternoon; yet Lucia was serving
such a “complete” afternoon tea! But a few hours make a great
difference in young appetites.
Clothes bothered Betty a little. She hoped that her frock was proper
for an “afternoon dress;” but she felt sure that many of the girls
would not dress elaborately, in spite of their coming to a house
presided over by a countess. Some of the girls could not, she knew.
When Miss Street and Miss Hogarth arrived in pretty but quiet
frocks, Betty felt that everybody would be “all right” for clothes.
Lucia herself must have had ideas on the subject; for she wore a
dress that she had worn to school. Mathilde and a few of the late
joiners, who had been largely influenced by Lucia’s membership, were
more or less elaborately dressed; but clothes ceased to have much
part in Betty’s thoughts, as she consulted with Miss Street and Miss
Hogarth and the committee about the meeting. The countess came in to
welcome the girls and their leaders most cordially. She well knew
that the girls would have felt defrauded if they had not had a
glimpse of her, as Betty gleaned from some little remark she made to
Lucia. Two sewing machines were in the rear drawing room and
Giovanna and Lina, in pretty caps and aprons were ready for work.
This arrangement was a surprise to Miss Street and Miss Hogarth, who
thanked the countess warmly and remarked that they might have
planned to have something beside clothes for dolls sewed that
afternoon if they had realized what an opportunity it was. To this
Countess Coletti replied that she would be glad to furnish machines
and maids and house room some other time if the girls were sewing
for the poor. She left the room with pleasant regrets and presently
Betty heard the car starting to take her to some engagement or a
shopping tour.
It was a petty scene, with the girls, their bright expressions and
young figures, their thimbles and sewing bags or boxes, the little
heaps of bright materials or filmy white or laces, wide or narrow,
and dolls of all sorts, either in the girls’ laps or upon the
tables. On the walls above them were several fine reproductions of
famous paintings and an etching or two. Objects of art had largely
been removed from this room to make place for chairs and folding
tables and the machines. It seemed a pity to drop any threads or
scraps upon that “gorgeous” oriental rug.
Betty clapped her hands for order. “While you get ready to begin
sewing girls, Miss Street and Miss Hogarth will tell you what the
plans are. The committee, too, may have some information to give
you, and I’ll call on the chairman now to speak of them. I am too
new as president to know much about what the ‘Y. W.’ does at
Christmas time, except a few of the results. I will ask Lilian
Norris to explain.”
Some of the girls were threading needles and beginning to sew on
edges, or to fit little garments to their dolls, according to the
state of progress to which the process had arrived.
“I’ve been talking to Miss Street and Miss Hogarth, girls, and this
is what we are to do. You know we decided to adopt a family; and as
the Woods family is such a nice one and needs everything so badly,
our leader thinks we might as well take them. Please put it to vote,
Betty, and then I’ll tell the rest.”
Betty, widely smiling at Lilian’s business-like methods, put the
question, with a unanimous “Aye” as the result.
“That is good,” said Lilian. “We filled two baskets as it happened,
at Thanksgiving, and we were told that both of them ‘went to the
spot.’ Miss Hogarth called afterwards, but the Sevillas, who were
the other people, very proud and not asking for any help, had moved;
and the Woods lady did not know where they had gone.”
At this Betty had a pang. Suppose they _were_ connected with
Ramon—and she had neither gone to ask them nor written to him! That
was the way a body perhaps missed a big opportunity.
But Lilian was still speaking. “I think, girls, that we should be
very careful, too, about what we say about our family. They are like
us in wanting to be independent and because they haven’t the good
luck we have, there is no need of rubbing it in by telling everybody
about them or what we do. Let’s have a little sympathy and delicacy!
“And now I’ll tell about the dolls. As you know, we bought some just
alike and passed them around to be dressed, each girl paying,
however, for her own doll. But then we had the membership drive and
a lot of new members and we decided, that is, the committee did,
that everybody could select her own doll. And _these_ are not to be
sent out with baskets, girls. They are to be for the Toy Shop that
we are going to have at the ‘Y,’ and sold. There is to be a prize
given for the best-dressed and the prettiest doll in the show—I
forgot to say that we’re going to have big Christmas doings at the
‘Y’ down town—and I do hope that our group gets the prize for the
prettiest doll and the foxiest booth! The prize is just some
decoration or something in the way of an honor, you know. I think
that is all, Madam President.”
Betty, who was very glad of this explanation, which corrected her
own ideas about the dolls, called on the two leaders to ask if they
had anything to tell the girls. Both of them confirmed Lilian’s
statements and urged the girls to make this the most beautiful
Christmas they had ever had, for themselves and for others, with
their thoughts on higher motives than merely what material things
they could get for themselves. Miss Hogarth asked for the names of
those who were willing to take part in the carols and those who
could furnish machines. Lucia’s hand went up to both questions and
Betty felt a little warmth about her heart to see how sweet Lucia’s
face had grown as she listened to Miss Hogarth’s brief references to
the higher ideals. Perhaps trouble was not so bad for Lucia after
all. And it all _must_ turn out right for her!
The rest of the afternoon was a jumble of visiting and sewing. The
presence of the maids and the machines called for more efficiency
than probably would have been shown in an ordinary meeting. Fingers
flew. The committee and Miss Street measured and cut out little
garments from the “dearest” little doll patterns, bought that
morning by Lucia and Betty, who risked sizes and thought that
Giovanna, at least, could reduce or enlarge when necessary. The
machines hummed away and the two maids seemed to have as much fun as
anybody, particularly as Lucia treated them “just like family,”
according to Mathilde, who was properly shocked. Mathilde, while
“sweet as sugar” to Lucia, according to Dotty Bradshaw, could say
some very funny things about her. “_I_ wouldn’t care for such a
friend,” said Dotty.
Betty had dropped down by Dotty, who wanted to know whether she
thought a certain scrap of pretty lace would make a good finish for
the neck of the doll dress she was making, or whether a little
embroidered collar would be more suitable to the pattern. Betty gave
her opinion on this weighty question and then Dotty informed her
that Mathilde was “going to ask her if Lucia’s father and mother
were going to get a divorce.”
“I thought I’d better warn you, Betty,” said Dotty, “I thought
Mathilde chose a funny place to talk about it—Lucia’s own house.”
Betty smiled. Could Dotty be curious, too? “Thanks, Dotty. Yes, it
isn’t usually done, talking about your hostess—or talking about
people who have just been entertaining you. If I _knew_, I should
scarcely give any information to Mathilde or anybody else. I’m
having such a lovely visit and I’m sure the more we know Lucia the
better we’ll like her. And isn’t it great of Countess Coletti to
take such an interest in ‘good works?’ Oh, yes, Selma, I’ll bring
you that pattern in just a minute. I think Peggy Pollard is using it
now.”
Betty did not try to do any sewing herself. She would finish her
doll at home. But Lucia, whose doll had not been brought downstairs,
came to ask her if she should display it.
“I’m afraid the girls will think I’m trying to show off if I do, but
several of them have asked me where my doll is and I had to tell
them I had one. I shouldn’t have gotten such an—elaborate one, I
suppose; but I did not think and I always choose what I think is the
prettiest. What do you think, Betty?”
“I think that you must decide for yourself, Lucia. It does seem a
perfect shame that they should not see that pretty thing!”
Lucia looked thoughtful and disappeared from the room for a short
time. But Betty noted on her return that she was not carrying the
doll; and at her first opportunity Lucia explained. “I did think
that perhaps I would bring it down. Giovanna is going to dress it
for me—or was. But just as I had it out of its box Bessie came
running down from upstairs and said that Grandmother Ferris had
asked about it. She had ‘Willie’ but where did ‘Josie’ go? Josie was
another of her children that died. Isn’t it _pitiful_? So I just
sent Bessie back with the other doll and I hope that they are having
a quiet time putting baby clothes on it. I’ll send Lina up as soon
as we serve. I think it would be nice to have some of the girls
serve and do it myself, don’t you?”
“Yes, I do, Lucia,” emphatically answered Betty. “How is the
grandmother today?”
“Just as quiet and happy as can be most of the time, Bessie says,
only awfully bewildered. Help me choose the girls, Betty.”
Betty shook her head in the negative, and with a smile advised Lucia
to choose the girls that would care most about it.
Lucia gave Betty a bright glance and laughed. Mathilde and two of
her friends were among the first asked, Betty saw. She was not
needed herself and helped to gather up the precious materials and
scraps, distributing them to one and another of the girls. Thimbles
were put away and sewing bags laid upon the tables while the
conversation did not wane. The girls selected by Lucia to help her
were chiefly for ornament; for Mathilde sat at the decorated table
in the dining room, to pour chocolate from a silver urn, and the
other girls passed the first plates and then sat down, with the rest
about the room, to enjoy their own. The careful butler and several
maids appeared to do the rest of it, though Lucia and the other
girls passed cakes from pretty containers on the table, for a second
time. It was all most delightful and from Lucia’s standpoint very
informal.
The countess came home early and was again gracious enough to appear
and speed the parting guests, standing by Lucia as the girls thanked
her for their good time as well as for her help to the group. “We
are certainly delighted, Lucia,” said Lilian Norris, “that you have
come into Lyon ‘Y’ and hope you’ll not regret it. We’ll not ask too
much of you. This has been wonderful.”
“It does not hurt any of us, my dear,” said Countess Coletti, “to
try to help a little.”