Her mate snapped her fingers in reply, and catching Freckles' hand raced
her down the long dormitory, down the two long flights of stairs to the
schoolroom where Sister Angelica was giving a lesson to the younger
girls.
"Well, Flibbertigibbet, what is it now?" said the sister smiling into
the eager face at her elbow. When Sister Angelica called her by her
nickname instead of by the Asylum number, Flibbertigibbet knew she was
in high favor. She nudged Freckles and replied:
"I want to whisper to you."
Sister Angelica bent down; before she knew it the little girl's arms
were about her neck and the child was telling her about the dance at the
stone house across the way. The sister smiled as she listened to the
rush of eager words, but she was so glad to find this madcap telling her
openly her heart's one desire, that she did what she had never done
before in all her life of beautiful child-consecrated work: she said
"Yes, and I will go with you. Wait for me outside the chapel door at
half-past four."
Flibbertigibbet squeezed her around the neck with such grateful vigor
that the blood rushed to poor Sister Angelica's head. She was willing,
however, to be a martyr in such a good cause. The little girl walked
quietly to the door, but when it had closed upon her she executed a
series of somersaults worthy of the Madison Square Garden acrobats.
"What'd I tell yer, what'd I tell yer!" she exclaimed, pirouetting and
somersaulting till the slower-moving Freckles was a trifle dizzy.
Within a quarter of an hour the three were snugly ensconced in the
window niche of the "cubby-hole," so Flibbertigibbet termed the
robing-room closet, and looking with all their eyes across the street.
They were directly opposite what Sister Angelica said must be the
drawing-room and on a level with it. As they looked, one moment the
windows were dark, in the next they were filled with soft yet brilliant
lights. The lace draperies were parted and the children could see down
the length of the room.
There she was! Hopping and skipping by the side of her father-lover and
drawing him to the central window. Behind them came the lovely young
lady and the Boy! The two were holding hands and swinging them freely as
they laughed and chatted together.
"That's the Boy!" cried Flibbertigibbet, wild with excitement.
"And that must be the Aunt Ruth she told about--oh, ain't she just
lovely!" cried Freckles.
"Watch out now, an' yer'll see the minute!" said Flibbertigibbet,
squeezing Sister Angelica's hand; Sister Angelica squeezed back, but
kept silence. She was learning many things before unknown to her. The
four came to the middle window and looked out, up, and all around. But
although the two children waved their hands wildly to attract their
attention, the good people opposite failed to see them because the
little window suffered eclipse in the shadow of the large electric
arc-light's green cap.
"She's goin' to begin!" cried Flibbertigibbet, clapping her hands.
The young lady sat down at the piano and began to play. Whether
Flibbertigibbet expected a variation of a "coon dance" or an Irish jig
cannot be stated with certainty, but that she was surprised is a fact;
so surprised, indeed, that for full two minutes she forgot to talk. To
the slow music, for such it was--Flibbertigibbet beat time with her
fingers on the pane to the step--the Marchioness and the Boy, pointing
their daintily slippered feet, moved up and down, back and forth,
swinging, turning, courtesying, bowing over the parquet floor with such
childishly stately yet charming grace that their rhythmic motions were
as a song without words.
The father-lover stood with his back to the mantel and applauded after
an especially well executed flourish or courtesy; Aunt Ruth looked over
her shoulder, smiling, her hands wandering slowly over the keys. At
last, the final flourish, the final courtesy. The Marchioness' dress
fairly swept the floor, and the Boy bowed so low that--well,
Flibbertigibbet never could tell how it happened, but she had a warm
place in her heart for that boy ever after--he quietly and methodically
stood head downwards on his two hands, his white silk stockings and
patent leathers kicking in the air.
The Marchioness was laughing so hard that she sat down in a regular
"cheese" on the floor; the father-lover was clapping his hands like mad;
the lady swung round on the piano stool and shook her forefinger at the
Boy who suddenly came right side up at last, hand on his heart, and
bowed with great dignity to the little girl on the floor. Then he, too,
laughed and cut another caper just as a solemn-faced butler came in with
wraps and furs. But by no means did he remain solemn long! How could he
with the Boy prancing about him, and the Marchioness playing at
"Catch-me-if-you-can" with her father-lover, and the lady slipping and
sliding over the floor to catch the Boy who was always on the other side
of the would-be solemn butler? Why, he actually swung round in a circle
by holding on to that butler's dignified coat-tails!
Nor were they the only ones who laughed. Across the way in one of the
Orphan Asylum windows, Sister Angelica and the children laughed too, in
spirit joining in the fun, and when the butler came to the window to
draw the shades there were three long "Ah's," both of intense
disappointment and supreme satisfaction.
"Watch out, now," said Flibbertigibbet excitedly on the way down into
the basement for supper and dishwashing, for it was their turn this
week, "an' yer'll see me dance yer a minute in the yard ter-morrow."
"Yer can't dance it alone," replied doubting Freckles; "yer've got to
have a boy."
"I don't want one; I'll take you, Freckles, for a boy." Clumsy Freckles
blushed with delight beneath her many beauty-spots at such promise of
unwonted graciousness on the part of her chum, and wondered what had
come over Flibbertigibbet lately.
* * * * *
A few hours afterwards when they went up to bed, they whispered together
again concerning the dance, and begged Sister Angelica to let them have
just one peep from the dormitory window at their house of delight--a
request she was glad to grant. They opened one of the inside blinds a
little way, and exclaimed at the sight. It was snowing. The children
oh'ed and ah'ed under their breath, for a snowstorm at Christmas time in
the great city is the child's true joy. At their opposite neighbor's a
faint light was visible in the balcony room; the wet soft flakes had
already ridged the balustrade, powdered the dwarf evergreens, topped the
cap of the electric arc-light and laid upon the concrete a coverlet of
purest white.
The long bare dormitory filled with the children--the fatherless and
motherless children we have always with us. Soon each narrow cot held
its asylum number; the many heads, golden, brown, or black, busied all
of them with childhood's queer unanchored thoughts, were pillowed in
safety for another night.
And without the snow continued to fall upon the great city. It graced
with equal delicacy the cathedral's marble spires and the forest of
pointed firs which made the numberless Christmas booths that surrounded
old Washington Market. It covered impartially, and with as pure a white,
the myriad city roofs that sheltered saint and sinner, whether among the
rich or the poor, among the cherished or castaways. It fell as thickly
upon the gravestones in Trinity's ancient churchyard as upon the freshly
turned earth in a corner of the paupers' burying ground; and it set upon
black corruption wherever it was in evidence the seal of a transient
stainlessness.