CHAPTER IIPARTY PLANS
The Riddle Clubwere very strict about not using their clubroom for any purpose other than club meetings. The six members were practically inseparable, going to school together, playing and working together most of the time outside of school. But no matter what they did, or what they wanted to play, unless they had a meeting of their Riddle Club on hand, the clubroom was left in perfect order and kept locked.
Perhaps you know all about the Riddle Club, but if you don’t, a few words will introduce you. It had been Polly Marley’s idea—this club—and she was the president. Fred Williamson was treasurer. Fred and Margy were twins, Artie was Polly Marley’s younger brother, and Ward and Jess Larue were brother and sister. Jess was two years older than Ward. These children lived in River Bend, a town on the Rocio River. Mr. Larue was the president of the line of steamboats that went up and down the river, carrying freight and passengers.
In the first book of this series, named “The Riddle Club at Home,” it has been told how the Riddle Club flourished and spurred another group of boys and girls to form a rival dub. This was known as the Conundrum Club, and Carrie Pepper was its president. They challenged the members of the Riddle Club to a memorable riddle contest and the latter came out victors.
Of course it was not to be thought of that a summer should separate such close friends, so what could be more natural than for the whole six to go camping at Lake Bassing? They took the Riddle Club with them, by-laws, president, treasurer and all, and what happened to them during a delightful two months, you may read in the second book of the series, called “The Riddle Club in Camp.” They camped on an island, and above them lived a queer old hermit on another island, while below their camp was another island on which the Conundrum Club established themselves.
Things were bound to happen with such a lively sextette around, and no one was disappointed. Artie fell over a bluff. The Conundrum Club suggested another riddle contest, which proved to be not much more to their advantage than the first. Then the children were able to solve the mystery of the kind old hermit. Next, as theseason was nearly over, they won the loving cup in the water carnival. Add to all this the new friends they made and the out-of-door glad days they had, and you’ll understand that the summer went too quickly to please them.
But schools will open in September, and the Riddle Club had to come back to River Bend. They were unexpectedly glad to get back to their own homes and to the clubroom in the Larue barn. This room had been given to them from the first meeting, and to the furniture they had collected for it, they were able to add several interesting trophies from their summer in camp.
There was the beautiful silver loving cup; a sketch of the entire club membership, made by an artist and framed for them by Mrs. Marley; the pennant they had flown in camp from their flag pole; not to mention a gun for which Artie had paid a dollar and which wouldn’t shoot but which, he thought, gave a distinguished touch to the room.
Jess mentioned the gun when, the next day, the chums met at the Williamsons’ house to discuss plans for their Hallowe’en party.
“I think,” she said soberly, “that we ought to give a play Thanksgiving and let Artie be a Puritan and carry his gun.”
“Oh, let’s!” cried Margy, with enthusiasm. “Let’s give a play! Mother gave me her old black lace dress yesterday! I could wear that.”
If there was one thing Margy loved to do, it was to “dress up” in grown people’s finery and sweep about and pretend that she was a princess.
“Who’ll write the play?” demanded Fred.
“You and Polly,” said Ward so promptly that Fred couldn’t help laughing.
“I thought you’d say something like that,” declared Fred. “But you can change your ideas right away. I know what we’re going to do Thanksgiving, but it isn’t that.”
“Fred!” said Polly, in a warning voice. “You told me you’d promised you wouldn’t tell.”
“Well, who’s telling?” demanded Fred. “I haven’t said a word.”
Of course that drove the others frantic with curiosity, but though they teased and coaxed and, finally, Ward and Artie threw themselves on Fred and got him down on the rug, not another word could they shake from him.
“You’ll know all about it in plenty of time,” he kept repeating.
“Does Polly know?” demanded Jess.
“No,” replied Fred; “not even Polly knows. No one knows but me.”
“Not Mother or Dad or Dora or——” Ward was beginning in a sing-song tone, but Fred put a hand gently over his mouth.
“Do keep still,” he said good-humoredly. “All the mothers and fathers know. Now stop asking questions.”
“You said no one knew except you alone,” Artie protested.
“I meant no one in the Riddle Club except me,” explained Fred.
“Well, anyway, we have Hallowe’en to think about,” said Polly, the tactful. “If we’re going to wear costumes, it’s time we planned ’em.”
“I had a perfectly wonderful idea,” declared Jess. “But I don’t know that I’ll tell it now; I can keep secrets, too.”
“Oh, Jess, darling, this isn’t a secret—it won’t be one very long, at any rate,” said Polly, softly. “We’ll all know soon, and it is something we’ll just love to do. I’m sure of that. Tell us your idea, Jess! Please do.”
It was impossible to resist Polly when she spoke like that, and Jess yielded. As a matter of fact, she had kept her wonderful idea to herself about as long as she cared to. She had reached the point where she was eager to share it with some one.
“I think it would be a good idea,” she saidproudly, “to come to the party dressed like animals!”
They stared at her silently, and she was disappointed. She had the plan so clearly in her own mind, she thought it must be plain to them all.
“Yes, animals,” Jess repeated. “You know all the people who go to Hallowe’en parties dress like clowns and gypsies and dancing girls and Brownies, and like that. Well, at our party, why couldn’t we come dressed like—like chickens and pigs and things?”
A shout of laughter interrupted her.
“Ward would make a handsome pig,” said Artie, a little unkindly.
Ward was a very fat boy, with a round, good-natured face that flushed at the slightest exertion. He couldn’t run two blocks without getting out of breath.
“I’ll be a pig,” said Ward now, “if you’ll be the goat.”
Artie reached for him and they went over on the rug in one of their friendly tussles. Mrs. Williamson had given them the dining-room to meet in, and had told them to have “all the fun you want.”
“I’m going to be a chicken,” announced Jess, fearful that some one else might want to take her character. “I thought of it yesterday when wewere watching Mrs. Pepper feed her chickens.”
“Where will you get the feathers?” asked the practical Margy.
“Oh, there must be feathers somewhere,” said Jess, carelessly. “I’ll fix that part all right.”
“It would be kind of fun, wouldn’t it?” Fred decided. “I wonder if we can get animal false-faces? I’m going to ask Dad to-night.”
Mr. Williamson kept the department store in River Bend, and he always carried a stock of false-faces for Hallowe’en. Fred was sure that if there were such things as “animal faces” his father would have them.
“Let’s not tell what kind of animals we’re going to be,” suggested Polly. “I love to be surprised.”
“You’d better tell your mother, Margy,” said Ward. “If she sees a bunch of animals coming to her house Hallowe’en night, she may think a circus broke loose somewhere and not let us in.”
“You can’t scare my mother,” declared Margy, proudly. “I don’t believe she’d be afraid of an elephant, if she met him. Not on Hallowe’en, at any rate.”
“We’re going to have the house to ourselves—did you know that?” said Fred. “Everything we need for the party will be all ready in the kitchen, and Mother is going to leave things to eatin the pantry. She and Dad are going over to Ward’s house. And Mr. and Mrs. Marley, too.”
“They’ll have a party of their own, I guess,” said Jess. “I don’t believe it is much fun for them to duck for apples and do the things we do. They would rather listen to Mrs. Marley play the piano and my mother play her violin than fuss around with Hallowe’en games.”
“They’re going to have the radio set that night, too,” Ward announced. “Fred said he’d take it down from the clubroom and set it up in the parlor. There’s a big musical program from some city that night.”
Fred was the wireless expert of the Riddle Club. He had first put up the handsome radio set the club had been given for their share in the capture of some radio thieves, and had taken it down and set it up in camp that summer as well. Then, when the time came to come home, he had taken down the tree aerials and had brought the set back to the Larue barn and set it up again in the clubroom. Now for this special night he would attach a loud speaker and arrange it in the Larue parlor so that the listening parents might enjoy the concert.
But the girls and boys could not talk long of this grown-up affair when their own thrilling party was yet to be arranged. They were used to planningtheir parties, and their mothers thought that in this way they had twice the usual amount of fun. Nearly every one can go to a party, if invited, but not every one could plan a party if he had to. The members of the Riddle Club did do both nicely.
“We’re going to have all the games we can think of,” said Margy. “Picking a ring out of a plate of flour; trying to bite a marshmallow on a string; ducking for apples, of course. What else, Fred?”
“I know,” cried Artie, before Fred could answer. “Go out in the garden and pull up a cabbage. I read about it in a book.”