THE CHRISTMAS TREE
“Oh, mother dear, you can’t come in just yet,” Lois said; “we don’t
want you to see the tree until it is entirely ready.”
Jessie, having promised that they would do all the work themselves, was
carrying out her agreement to the letter, and Mrs. Page, who wanted to
help them, had to be contented merely to give advice. There had been
many secret sessions in the play-room and in the Morgans’ attic, and
Jessie and Lois had taken several trips to the village store. They had
just come in from a final one now.
“Your money seems to have held out like the widow’s cruse of oil,” said
Mrs. Page.
“Why, yes, mother. We thought we had spent it all, and we wanted to
get some more animals, and Reuben gave us twenty cents, and then Joel
Carpenter gave us a quarter, and then Reuben did not like to have Joel
give more than he did, when Joel wasn’t in the secret to begin with, so
Reuben gave ten cents more, and then Joel gave ten, and then Reuben
gave another ten. It was as exciting as an auction. Reuben had to
borrow of Amyas, and Amyas wouldn’t lend him more than ten cents, so
Reuben had to drop out because he was ‘dead broke,’ he said, and Joel
came out five cents ahead of him. I think it was too bad, for he wasn’t
half so interested in the tree as Reuben was.”
“But it was nice to get the extra five cents,” said Jessie.
Just before the guests came, Mrs. Page slipped into the play-room,
unseen by Lois and Jessie, and tied six pairs of mittens, and three red
tam-o’-shanters and three blue ones, to the tree. She also decorated
the branches with two pink and two scarlet flannel petticoats, and
some socks. After this she tied on thirteen costume crackers. Then she
quietly slipped out of the room.
The Donnellys were so afraid of being late that they arrived half an
hour too early. This was a little inconvenient, for Jessie and Lois
were dressing.
Maggie knocked on their door and said, “Your company has come. They are
waiting in the entry.”
“Dear me, what shall we do!” said Lois. “Do you mind if they stay in
the kitchen, Maggie, until we come down?”
“It would hurt their feelings and make them think they had come too
early,” said Jessie. “Aunt Elizabeth,” she called out, “would you mind
talking to the Donnellys until we are ready? Please say how ashamed we
are to be so late. Perhaps they would like to go down to the laundry
and see Minnie and the Trio Club.”
And so it happened that Mrs. Page headed a procession of six Donnellys,
all painfully shy and all dressed in their best clothes, and took them
down to the temporary dwelling-place of the Trio Club.
The ice was soon broken, for no one could long feel any stiffness in
the presence of these engaging animals.
Each Donnelly made a dive for a kitten. George Thomas secured one,
Beulah was the happy possessor of a second, while Michael and Evelina
chased Presto around the room, and Michael finally got her, much to
Evelina’s disappointment. Miriam Donnelly had taken Minnie in her arms,
while May Lilian walked around the room, stroking each kitten in turn.
“What is this one’s name?” she asked shyly.
“That is Minnie. That is the mother cat.”
“My! but she looks like a kitten herself!” said May Lilian.
“Yes, she is a small cat.”
“And what is this one’s name?”
“Allegro.”
“What a funny name!”
“I didn’t name her,” said Mrs. Page. “If I had, I should have given her
a good sensible name.”
“And what is mine called?” asked George Thomas.
“Andantino.”
“I guess you didn’t name that one either,” said Michael, with a grin.
“We are ready now,” Jessie called down.
The other guests had come, and they were all taken upstairs, and the
door of the play-room was flung open.
The Morgans and Jessie and Joel Carpenter had seen other Christmas
trees that were more elaborate, while to Lois and the Donnellys,
who only knew Sunday-school and school Christmas trees, there was
an especial charm about this one because it was their very own. The
four Donnelly girls sat in a row on the sofa, with their feet stuck
out primly in front of them. They looked very grave, as if it would
be quite improper to smile. Miriam, who was the oldest, kept them in
excellent order. Michael and George Thomas politely stood until Mrs.
Page asked them to be seated.
Jessie and Lois gave a cry of pleasure when they saw the petticoats and
tam-o’-shanters. “How perfectly splendid, Aunt Elizabeth!” Jessie said.
The tree was a pretty sight, for it had many candles on it, and the
little points of light were very brilliant against the background of
green. Everything meant some happy recollection to Lois: the tree
reminded her of that beautiful walk in the woods, and the candy-horns
made her think of a delightful snowy afternoon in the Morgans’ attic,
when she and Jessie and the Morgans sat around the table with paste and
scissors and colored paper. She was so awkward, and Anne and Amyas were
so kind in helping her! And the candles and the animals! Would she ever
forget that trip to the village store, when Amyas came in unexpectedly
and made the clerk take ten cents off the whole amount, because they
had bought so many things? There was a second trip and a third, and
still another, each with some pleasant memory quite distinct from all
the rest. And it was dear Jessie who had made it possible. Without her
they would not have had a Christmas tree.
The Donnellys were delighted with their presents; even Miriam’s
face relaxed when she was given a blue hair ribbon and a pretty
handkerchief with an M in one corner. George Thomas was much pleased
with a teeter with a yellow chicken on either end. His eyes were glued
to this toy. “First it goes down, and then it goes up, and when one
chicken is up, the other is down,” said George Thomas.
The costume crackers were a delightful surprise, and Mrs. Page told
the children they might dress up in the contents before they had their
simple refreshments. George Thomas’s costume cracker contained a pink
sun-bonnet, in which he courageously arrayed himself, while Beulah wore
a soldier’s cap, and Lois put on a helmet, and Ellen donned a fool’s
cap.
“I am sorry we can only have lemonade and Uneeda biscuit and
ginger-snaps,” said Lois, as Maggie came in with a tray; “our money did
not hold out for everything.”
“It is a pretty good kind of Uneeda biscuit,” said Michael, who had
at last found courage to speak. He had just put on a blue and yellow
toque, and every one seemed so amused by the effect that he felt that,
in spite of Miriam, it was the proper thing to smile.
Some fairy wand seemed to have changed the Uneeda biscuit into Maggie’s
delicate orange cake and chocolate cake, and presently, in addition
to the lemonade, there came in some raspberry sherbet and macaroon
ice-cream.
The children’s eyes shone, and George Thomas finally put down his
teeter.
“First it goes up, and then it goes down,” he said dreamily, “and when
one chicken is--my! what lovely pink and white ice-cream!”
“You may put your presents on the table,” said Mrs. Page to the
Donnellys, “and then you will have room for your plates.”
The four Donnelly girls rose and carried their treasures across the
room, and the boys followed their example.
“Nobody must touch my teeter,” said George Thomas.
The presents cost very little, but there were a good many of them, for
each Donnelly had a pencil and a block of paper, and the girls had
sheets of colored tissue paper, and bags of beads, while each of the
smaller children had a toy animal, and the older ones were given games
and books that had once belonged to the Morgans.
After the cake and ice-cream had been eaten, there came the great
surprise of the evening, for Jessie had a small present ready for each
of the Morgans and Joel Carpenter and Lois, as well as another trifle
for each Donnelly.
Lois’s was a small, flat parcel tied with a pink ribbon.
“How perfectly lovely!” she said, as she gazed at the contents of the
package. “What a beautiful expression she has!”
“Is it a photograph of your mother?” asked Amyas.
“No, it’s my cat. Such a dear picture of Minnie in her basket! I wish I
had a picture of the Trio Club, too.”
Then to her joy she discovered that there were two mounted photographs,
and lifting the upper one, she saw underneath the three black faces of
the Trio Club standing out in bold relief against the light basket.
“Oh, the darling things!” she exclaimed. “That is Andantino, I am sure,
but I can’t tell Presto and Allegro apart. I wish I could have had a
picture of their legs, but you can’t expect everything.”
“My goodness! I should say you couldn’t,” said Amyas. “Jessie got me
to take their pictures, and the way they skipped around was a caution.
Just as I thought I had them fixed, one would scramble out of the
basket and scoot off to its mother. And the mother was a terror. Twice
I thought I had got her, when she opened her mouth and yelled. She’s
enough to spoil any picture. The next time Jessie asks me to take the
photograph of a cat, I am going to break my leg, or go out of town.”
The Morgans and Joel Carpenter went early, as they were going home to
their own Christmas trees, and the Donnellys looked at one another
irresolutely. Miriam was equally afraid of leaving too soon and staying
too late.
“You haven’t got to go yet,” said Jessie. “It is so early.”
“I don’t know as there is any great hurry,” said Miriam.
“Mother said we might stay until half-past seven if you seemed to
expect us to,” said George Thomas.
* * * * *
“Well, children, it was a great success,” Mrs. Page said to Jessie
and Lois, as the last Donnelly closed the front door behind him, “and
certainly no children could have better manners than those Donnellys.
You must feel very tired, Jessie dear. Here is a foreign letter for
you; it came in the five o’clock mail.”
A Christmas letter from her mother! Jessie gave a little cry of delight
as she opened it. There were two foreign postal-cards inside; one was
the charming picture of an Angora cat, for Lois, the other, which was
for Jessie, was a group of three children standing with their arms
around one another.
“It is like you and Ellen and me,” said Lois.
Jessie read her letter through eagerly. She glanced up with an
expression of rapturous delight.
“They are coming earlier than I expected them,” she said. “Father is so
much better, and has his heart so set on getting home, that the doctor
says they may sail in January. Oh, Aunt Elizabeth! It seems too good to
be true!”
The tears came into Lois’s eyes. The months had been long as they
passed, but as she looked back, it seemed only a short time since that
April afternoon when her dear borrowed sister had alighted at the gate,
and she had gone so eagerly to meet her, and had found the tears in
Jessie’s eyes. Now it was Jessie who was happy and she who was sad. It
was just like George Thomas’s teeter.
Jessie saw that Lois was crying. “You darling child, what is the
matter?” she asked.
“I am thinking of the time when you will be going away. It has all been
so lovely, everything from the very first minute. And it will be over
so soon, and you won’t be my sister any more.”
“It isn’t as if I were going far. We shall see each other every day;
and you will be coming to spend a night with me every week, and I shall
spend a night with you. We shall always be like sisters. If you once
have a sister, you can’t lose her,” said Jessie.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:
Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.
Perceived typographical errors have been corrected.
Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.
Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.