A BIRTHDAY PARTY
Palmer knew this to be true, for Mr. Carter had expressly said that at
the first sign of unfair play the battle would be called off. He made
few rules for his pupils, but those he did make were never to be
lightly broken.
"I'll bet that Tim Roon threw it!" stormed Meg. "You wait!"
Meg was very quick to think and to act, and the sight of her favorite
brother, one blue eye almost closed, roused her to strong measures.
"Come on, and rush 'em!" she cried, her little arms waving like
windmills. "Don't stand here, throwing balls. Let's capture their old
fort!"
For an instant they stared at her, and then, the idea appealing, the
whole Black army poured over the side of the fort, and charged on the
enemy, shrieking wildly. Bobby, who could barely see where he was
going, was swept along with the rest.
Upstairs in the schoolhouse, the teachers looked at each other in
surprise, and Mr. Carter was equally astonished.
"Surrender!" shouted Meg, the first to leap the wall of the Orange fort.
The Orange army simply backed. It was very funny to see them. They
had not expected an open attack, and they were too taken by surprise to
guard their piles of ammunition. As the opposing forces climbed their
wall they dumbly gave way and moved back, back, till, with a cry of
joy, the Black fighters swooped upon the orderly mounds of snowballs.
With their ammunition gone, of course the Oranges could do nothing less
than give in.
Mr. Carter came up laughing.
"Well, Tim, that was a surprise attack for fair, wasn't it?" he asked
pleasantly. "I think we'll have to say the Black side won.
Congratulations, Bobby. And now, Generals, shake hands, and the
biggest fight in Oak Hill school history will be over."
Tim put out his lip stubbornly.
"I didn't know it was fair to play like that," he argued sourly. "We
could have taken their fort easy, if you'd said that was the way to
play. 'Sides Meg Blossom put 'em to it. Bobby hadn't a thing to do
with that."
"Yes, Meg did," said Bobby hurriedly, trying to edge out of the crowd.
"She really won the war."
"Just one moment," Mr. Carter spoke coolly, and yet there was an odd
little snap in his voice that made every boy and girl turn toward him.
"Look at me, please, Bobby. What happened to your eye?"
"Oh, gee," mumbled Bobby unhappily. He had hoped to get away
unnoticed. "I guess--I guess a snowball hit it."
"A packed ball, probably dipped in water first," announced Mr. Carter,
gently touching the poor sore eye. "Tim, do you know anything about
such a ball?"
"No, I don't," said Tim hastily. "Nobody can say our side packed
balls."
"No one can prove your side threw a packed ball," corrected the
principal pointedly. "Still, it is hardly likely that Bobby's men
would have hit their own general with a frozen ball. I don't intend to
try to find out any more, Tim. But I'm sorry that in every game there
must always be some one who doesn't play fair."
Mr. Carter said that Bobby should go home at once and let his mother
put something on his eye. It was a real victory for the Black's side,
he announced firmly. And Bobby, going home with Meg, his handkerchief
tied over his puffy eye, felt like a real general, wounded, tired, but
successful and happy.
Mother Blossom always knew what to do for the little hurts, and she
bandaged Bobby's eye and listened to the account of the snow fight with
great interest.
"Meg, Meg!" Dot's voice sounded from the front hall, as Mother Blossom
finished tying a soft handkerchief around Bobby's head to hold the
eye-pad in place. "Is Meg home yet?"
Dot appeared in the doorway of Mother Blossom's room.
"What's the matter with Bobby?" she asked.
Bobby explained, but Dot was too excited to pay much attention to the
story of the fight. She had other matters on her mind.
"Meg, you've got a letter," she announced. "We all have. Only
Twaddles and I opened ours."
"A letter!" repeated Meg, delighted. "Who wrote it?"
"Give Bobby his," directed Mother Blossom. "Open them, dears. That is
the only sure way to know what is inside."
Meg and Bobby tore open the square pink envelopes together, but Meg
read hers first.
"Marion Green's going to give a birthday party!" she exclaimed. "Isn't
that fun! I can wear my white dress. What'll we take her, Mother?"
Mother Blossom said that they would think up something nice before the
day for the party came, and then they heard Father Blossom come in, and
down the four little Blossoms rushed to tell him about the snow battle
and the party.
"I'm glad," announced Dot with a great deal of satisfaction at the
supper table that night, "there's something in this town they don't say
Twaddles and I are too young to go to!"
Everybody laughed, and Father Blossom said that Dot shouldn't worry
about her age, for she was growing older every year.
Marion Green's party was the next Saturday afternoon, and Mother
Blossom and Aunt Polly helped the children to get dressed.
"If I only had my locket," sighed Meg. "It would look so pretty with
this white dress. Oh, dear! I wish I had remembered about taking it
off."
Bobby and Meg had hunted often after school for the locket, but though
they were sure they had been over every inch of ground where Meg had
coasted, they could not find the pretty ornament.
"Don't sigh for things gone," said Aunt Polly, giving Meg a kiss. "We
all know you will be more careful another time, dear. Now I'm sure you
look very nice. And, as your grandmother used to say, 'behave as well
as you look.'"
Meg wore a white dress with blue sash and hair-ribbons, and Dot was all
in pink--dress, ribbons and socks.
"I hope," remarked Twaddles, as they started for Marion's house, "that
the ice-cream will be chocolate."
"I don't think you should think about what you're going to get to eat,"
reproved Meg primly, feeling very much the older sister because she was
wearing gloves, kid ones. "It's colder, isn't it?"
It really was very cold, and the four little Blossoms were glad when
they reached Marion's house.
"The party's going on," observed Dot, as they went up the steps. She
was seized with a sudden fit of shyness, and pressed close to Meg.
Meg and Bobby were experienced in the matter of parties, and they knew
you went upstairs to take off your things and then came down to present
your birthday present.
"See my new locket and chain," said Ruth Ellis, a little girl Meg knew,
who was fluffing out her hair-ribbon before the glass in Marion's
mother's room where the girls were told to leave their wraps. "My
uncle gave it to me."
Poor Meg remembered her lost locket again. She thought it much
prettier than Ruth's, and she would have been so glad to have it around
her neck to show the other girls.
The four little Blossoms met in the hall and went down together. They
had brought Marion a knitting set, two ivory needles with sterling
silver tops, which folded into a neat leather case, and Marion, who was
a famous little knitter, was delighted.
All the presents were put on the center table after they were opened
and admired, and then the children played games till Mrs. Green
announced that there was something in the dining-room to interest them.
"Gee, it is chocolate," whispered Twaddles shrilly, as the plates of
ice-cream followed the sandwiches.
The cake was white with eight pink candles, and if anything looks
prettier or tastes better than chocolate ice-cream and white cake, do
tell me what it is.
"Now we can fish," remarked Marion, as they left the table.
Back of the wide deep sofa in the parlor, Marion's mother had fixed a
"fish pond," and now she gave each guest a rod and line with a hook at
the end, and told them all to try their luck.
Twaddles fished first. His hook mysteriously caught something right
away, and he drew up a tissue paper parcel that proved to contain a
little glass jar of candy sticks. Twaddles liked them very much.
Meg caught a pretty silk handkerchief, and Dot found a soap bubble set
on the end of her line. Bobby's catch was a box of water-color paints.
After every child had fished and caught something, it was five o'clock
and the party was over. They said good-by to Marion and her mother,
and told them they had had the nicest time, which was certainly true.
"My, but isn't it cold!" exclaimed Mrs. Green, as she held open the
door for a group of the party guests to go out. "We'll have skating
next week if this weather keeps up."
The four little Blossoms hurried home, for the cold nipped their noses
and the tips of Meg's fingers in her spandy new kid gloves.
"I like a party," said Dot suddenly, running to keep up with Bobby,
"where you get presents, too."
Father Blossom opened the door for them, and they were glad to see the
fire blazing cheerily in the living-room.
"Well, well, how did the party go?" asked Father, pulling off Meg's
gloves for her, and drawing her into his lap. "Presents, too? Why,
Twaddles, I thought this was Marion's birthday."
Twaddles unscrewed the top of his candy jar and offered Father Blossom
a green-colored stick.
"We took Marion a present," he explained serenely. "But I guess her
mother thought it wasn't fair for her to get 'em all. Everybody fished
for something, Daddy."