AN EIGHTEENTH BIRTHDAY
Every American will always remember that winter of 1917 as being one of
extreme unrest. Would we or would we not be plunged into the World War?
Should we get in the game or should we sit quietly by and see Germany
overrun land and sea?
Valhalla was not too much out of the world to share in the excitement,
and like most of the world was divided in its opinions. Douglas and her
father were for the sword and no more pens. Helen and Mrs. Carter felt
it was a pity to mix up in a row that was not ours, although in her
secret soul Helen knew full well that the row was ours and if war was to
be declared she would be as good a fighter as the next. Nan was an out
and out pacifist and declared the world was too beautiful to mar with
all of this bloodshed. Lucy insisted that Nan got her sentiments from
Count de Lestis, who had been "hogging" a seat by her sister quite often
in the weeks before that day in March when diplomatic relations with
Germany were broken off by our country. As for Lucy: she could tell you
all about the causes of the war and was quite up on Bismarck's policy,
etc. She delighted her father with her knowledge of history and her
logical views of the present situation. She and Mag were determined to
go as Red Cross nurses if we did declare war, certain that if they
tucked up their hair and let down their dresses no one would dream they
were only fourteen. Bobby walked on his toes and held his head very
high, trying to look tall, hoping he could go as a drummer boy or
something if he could only stretch himself a bit.
"Good news, girls!" cried Helen one evening in February when they had
drawn their seats around the roaring fire piled high with wood cut by
Mr. Carter, whose muscles were getting as hard as iron from his outdoor
work.
"What?" in a chorus from the girls, always ready for any kind of news,
good or bad.
"The count is going to have a ball!"
"Really? When?"
"On the twenty-second of February! He says if he gives a party on
Washington's birthday nobody can doubt his patriotism."
"Humph! I don't see what business he has with patriotism about our
Washington," muttered Lucy.
"But he does feel patriotic about the United States, he told me he did,"
said Nan.
"I think he means to take out his naturalization papers in the near
future," said Mr. Carter.
"He tells me he feels very lonesome now that he is in a way debarred
from his own country," sighed Mrs. Carter. "That book he wrote has made
the Kaiser very angry."
"Well, after the war is over that book will raise him in the estimation
of all democracies," suggested Douglas.
"Mag says that Billy wrote to Brentano's to try and get him that book
and they say they can't find it; never heard of it," blurted out Lucy.
"It has perhaps not been translated into English," said Helen loftily.
"Mag says that that's no matter. Brentano will get you any old book in
any old language if it is in existence."
"How can they when a book has been suppressed? I reckon the Kaiser is
about as efficient about suppressing as he is about everything else.
Well, book or no book, I'm glad to be going to a ball. He says we must
ask our friends from Richmond and he is going to invite everybody in the
county and have a great big splendid affair, music from Richmond, and
supper, too."
"Kin I go?" asked Bobby, curling up in Helen's lap, a way he had of
doing when there was no company to see him and sleep was getting the
better of him.
"Of course you can, if you take a good nap in the daytime."
"Daddy and Mumsy, you will go, surely," said Douglas.
"Yes, indeed, if your mother wants to! I'm not much of a dancer these
days, but I bet she can outdance any of you girls. Eh, Mother?"
"Not as delicate as I am now; but of course I shall go to the ball to
chaperone my girls," said the little lady plaintively. "I doubt my
dancing, however."
"He says we must ask Dr. Wright and Lewis and any other people we want.
He says he is really giving this ball to us because we have been so
hospitable to him," continued Helen.
"We haven't been any nicer to him than Miss Ella and Miss Louise," said
Lucy, who seemed bent on obstructing.
"But they are too old to have balls given to them," laughed Helen. "They
are going, though. I went to see them this afternoon with Count de
Lestis and they are just as much interested as I am. They asked the
privilege of making the cakes for the supper and he was so tactful that
he did not tell them he was to have a grand caterer to do the whole
thing. The old ladies just love to do it, and one is to make angel's
food and one devil's food.
"The Suttons are going," and Helen held the floor without interruptions
because of the subject that was interesting to all the family. "Mr.
Sutton says if the roads permit he will send his big car to take our
whole family, and if the roads are too bum he will have the carriage out
for Mrs. Sutton and Mumsy, and all of us can go in the hay wagon."
"Grand! I hope the roads will be muddy up to the hubs!" cried Lucy. "Hay
wagons are lots more fun than automobiles."
"Hard on one's clothes, though," and Helen looked a little rueful. The
question of dress was important when one had nothing but old last year's
things that were so much too narrow.
"What are you going to wear to the ball?" asked Douglas that night when
she and Helen were snuggling down in their bed in the little room up
under the roof.
"I haven't anything but my rose chiffon. It is pretty faded looking and
hopelessly out of style, but I am going to try to freshen it up a bit.
Ah me! I don't mind working, but I do wish I were not an unproductive
consumer. I'd like to make some money myself and sometimes buy
something."
Douglas patted her sister consolingly. "Poor old Helen! I do feel so bad
about you."
"Well, you needn't! But I did see such a love of a dancing frock when we
were down town that day with Cousin Elizabeth: white tulle over a silver
cloth with silver girdle and trimmings. It was awfully simple but so
effective. I could just see myself in it. I ought to be ashamed to let
clothes make so much difference with me, but I can't help it. I am
better about it than I was at first, don't you think?"
"I think you are splendid and I also think you have the hardest job of
all to do: working all the time and never making any money."
The next morning Douglas held a whispered conversation with Nan before
they got off to their respective schools.
"See what it costs but don't let Helen know. She will be eighteen
tomorrow, and if it isn't worth a million, I am going to take some of my
last month's salary and get it for her."
When Nan, who was not much of a shopper, approached the great windows of
Richmond's leading department store, what was her joy to see the very
gown that Douglas had described to her displayed on Broad Street and
marked down to a sum in the reach of a district school teacher.
"It looks so like Helen, somehow, that I can almost see her wearing it
in place of the wax dummy," exclaimed Nan.
"Must I charge it, Miss Carter?" asked the pleasant saleswoman as she
took the precious dress out of the show-window.
"Please, Miss Luly, somehow I'd rather not charge it, but I haven't the
money today. Couldn't you fix it up somehow so I could take it with me
and bring you the money tomorrow? We don't charge any more, but if I
don't buy it right now I'm so afraid somebody else might get it."
The smiling saleswoman, who had been waiting on the Carters ever since
the pretty Annette Sevier came a bride to Richmond, held a conference
with the head of the firm on how this could be managed.
"Miss Nan Carter is very anxious not to charge, but can't pay until
tomorrow."
"Ummm! A little irregular! What Carter is it?"
"Mr. Robert Carter's daughter!"
"Let her have it and anything else she wants on any terms she wishes.
Robert Carter's name on a firm's books is the same as money in the bank.
I have wondered why his account has been withdrawn from our store," and
the head of the firm immediately dictated a letter to his former patron,
requesting in polite terms that he should run up as big a bill as he
wished and that he could pay whenever he got ready. So very polite was
the letter that one almost gathered he need not pay at all.
Mr. Carter laughed aloud when he read the letter, remembering those days
not yet a year gone by when the bills used to pile in on the first of
every month and he would feel that they must be paid immediately and the
only way to do it was redouble his energy and work far into the night.
The flat box with the precious dancing dress was not an easy thing to
carry on stilts, but the lane was muddy and Nan had to do it somehow.
With much juggling she got safely over the dangers of the road and
smuggled it into the house without Helen's seeing it.
"I got it!" Nan whispered to Douglas when she could get her alone.
"But you didn't have the money! I asked you to find out the price
first," said Douglas, fearing Nan, in her zeal, had overstepped the
limit in price. "I didn't want anything charged. I am so afraid we might
get started to doing it again."
"Never! I just kind of borrowed it until tomorrow. You see I struck a
sale and they couldn't save it for me because there were only a few of
them. I told them I couldn't charge but would bring the money tomorrow,
and Miss Luly fixed it up for me, somehow, and told me I could have the
whole department store on any terms I saw fit to dictate."
Morning dawned on Helen's eighteenth birthday but found her in not very
jubilant spirits. It isn't much fun to have an eighteenth birthday when
you have to bounce out of bed and rush into your clothes to see that a
poor ignorant country servant doesn't make the toast and scramble the
eggs before she even puts a kettle of water on for coffee. Chloe always
progressed backwards unless Helen was there to do the head work.
Helen found Chloe had already descended her perilous ladder and had the
stove hot and the kettle on as a birthday present to her beloved
mistress. Chloe really adored Helen and did her best to learn and
remember. The breakfast table was set, too, and Chloe's eyes were
shining as though she had something to say but wild horses would not
make her say it.
The sisters came in at the first tap of the bell and her father was in
his place, too. Helen started to seat herself at her accustomed place,
but at a shout from Lucy looked before she sat. Her chair was piled high
with parcels.
"Happy birthday, honey!" said Douglas.
"Happy birthday, daughter!" from Mr. Carter.
"Happy birthday! Happy birthday!" shouted all of them in chorus.
"Why, I didn't know anybody remembered!" cried Helen.
"Not remember your eighteenth birthday! Well, rather!" said Mr. Carter.
Then began the opening of the boxes while Chloe stood in the corner
grinning for dear life.
A pearl pin from Mrs. Carter, one she had worn when she first met her
husband, was in the small box on top. An old-fashioned filigree gold
bracelet was Mr. Carter's gift. It had belonged to his mother, for whom
Helen was named.
"It will look very lovely on your arm, my dear," he said when Helen
kissed him in thanks.
Cousin Elizabeth Somerville had sent her ten dollars in gold; Lewis,
some new gloves; there was a vanity box from Lucy with a saucy message
about always powdering her nose; a little thread lace collar from Nan,
made by her own hands; and to balance all was a five-pound box of candy
from Dr. Wright.
"I had a big marble for you, but it done slipt out'n my pocket," said
Bobby, and then he had to give a big hug and a kiss, which Helen
declared was better than even a marble.
"But you haven't opened your big box, the one at the bottom," insisted
Nan. It had got covered up with papers and Helen had overlooked it.
"Please hurry up and open it because Lucy and I have to beat it. It will
be train time before we know it."
As Helen untied the strings and unwrapped the tissue paper that was
packed around the contents of the big box you could have heard a pin
drop in that dining-room at Valhalla. She eagerly pulled aside the
papers and then shook out the glimmering gown.
"Oh, Douglas! Douglas! You shouldn't have done it! It is even prettier
than I remembered it to be!"
"Mind out, don't splash on it," warned Nan just in time to keep the two
great tears that welled up into Helen's eyes from spotting the exquisite
creation.
"My Miss Helen's gwinter look like a angel whin she goes ter de count's
jamboree," declared Chloe.
"Well, your Miss Douglas is the angel and she's going to have to have a
new dress with slits in the shoulder-blades to let her wings come
through," sobbed Helen, laughing at the same time as she held the dress
up in front of her and danced around the table. She had thought nobody
remembered her eighteenth birthday and now found nobody had forgotten
it.
"You shouldn't have afforded it, Douglas. I can't keep it. It would be
too selfish of me."
"Marked down goods not sent on approval," drawled Nan.