CHAPTER VIThe MayonnaiseThe girls gave a party to celebrate the recovery of Cuthbert. They were allowed to do this on one condition, that they made everything for it themselves.This was Mr. Leighton's idea, and it found rapturous approval in the ranks of the family, and immediate rebellion in the heart of Mrs. Leighton. It was her one obstinacy that she should retain full hold of the reins of housekeeping. Once let a lot of girls into the kitchen, and where are you?"Once let a lot of girls grow up with no kind of responsibility in life, and where are you then?" asked Mr. Leighton. "I don't want my girls to drift. No man is really healthy unless he is striving after something, if it's only after finding a new kind of beetle. I don't see how a girl can be healthy without a definite occupation.""They make their beds, and they have their music," sighed Mrs. Leighton. "Girls in my day didn't interfere with the housekeeping.""I've thought about their music," said Mr. Leighton. "I'm glad they have it. But it isn't life, you know. A drawing-room accomplishment isn't life. I want them to be equipped all round. Not just by taking classes either. Classes end by making people willing to be taught, but the experiences of life make them very swift to learn. We can't have them sitting dreaming about husbands for ever. Dreams and ideals are all very well, but one scamps the realities if one goes on at them too long. Elma means to marry a duke, you know. Isn't it much better that in the meantime she should learn to make a salad?""The servants will be so cross," said Mrs. Leighton. She invariably saw readily enough where she must give in, but on these occasions she never gave in except with outward great unwillingness."Oh, perhaps not," said Mr. Leighton. "They have dull enough lives themselves. I'm sure it will be rather fun for them to see Mabel making cakes.""Mabel can't make cakes," exclaimed Mrs. Leighton. Her professional talents were really being questioned here. Throughout the length and breadth of the country, nobody made cakes like Mrs. Leighton.Mr. Leighton grew a little bit testy."You know, my dear, if this house were a business concern it would be your duty to take your eldest daughter into partnership at this stage. As it is, you seem to want to keep her out for ever."Mrs. Leighton sighed heavily."That's just it, John," said she; "I want to keep her out for ever. I want them all to remain little children, and myself being mother to them. Since Mabel got her hair up--already it's different. I feel in an underhand sort of way that I'm being run by my own daughter--I really do.""More like by your own son," said Mr. Leighton. "The way you give in to that boy is a disgrace.""Oh, Cuthbert's different," said Mrs. Leighton brightly."Poor Mabel," smiled Mr. Leighton.It was an old subject with them, thrashed out again and again, ever since Cuthbert as a rather spoiled child of seven had had his little nose put out of joint by the first arrival of girls in the imperious person of Mabel. Mrs. Leighton had always felt a little grieved with the absurdly rapid manner in which Mr. Leighton's affections had gone over to Mabel."In any case, try them with the party," said he. "The only thing that can happen is for the cook to give notice.""And I shall have to get another one, of course." Mrs. Leighton's voice dwelt in a suspiciously marked manner on the pronoun."Now there's another opportunity for making use of Mabel," said her husband.Mrs. Leighton let her hands fall."Engage my own servants! What next?" she asked."Oh, I don't know," said he. "Cuthbert does heaps of things for me. You women are the true conservatives. If we had you in power there would be no chance for the country.""Well, you might have persuaded Cuthbert to succeed you as Chairman of your Company, with a steady income and all that sort of thing," she exclaimed, "instead of rushing him into a profession which keeps him tied night and day, and gives him no return as yet for all his work.""I should never stand in the way of enthusiasm," said her husband. "Cuthbert has a real genius for his profession.""Then why not find a profession for Mabel?""I have thought of that. It seems right, however, that a man ought to be equipped for one profession, and a girl for several. I can always leave my girls enough money to keep the wolf from the door at least. I have an objection to any girl being obliged to work entirely for her living. Men ought to relieve them of that at least. But we must give them occupation; work that develops. Come, come, my dear; you must let them have their head a little, even although they ruin the cakes. A good mother makes useless daughters, you know.""Well, it's a wrench, John.""There, there," he smiled at her."And the servants are sure to give notice."She regretted much of her pessimism, however, when she gave the news to the girls. Not for a long time had they been so animated. Each took her one department in the supper menu prepared under the guidance of Mrs. Leighton.First, chicken salad inserted into a tomato, cut into water-lily shape, reposing on lettuce leaves--one on each little plate, mayonnaise dressing on top.The mayonnaise captured Mabel."But you can't make it, it's a most trying thing to do--better let cook make it," interjected Mrs. Leighton."What about our party?" asked Mabel."Very well," said an abject mother.So that was settled.Then fruit salad, immediately claimed by Jean, who knew everything there was to be known of fruit, inside and out, as she explained volubly. Mrs. Leighton's quiet face twitched a trifle and then resolved itself into business lines once more.Meringues! they must have meringues! Nobody seemed to rise to that. Elma felt it was her turn."They look awfully difficult," said she, "but I could try a day or two before. I'll do the meringues."This cost her a great effort. Mother didn't appear at all encouraging, She snipped her lips together in rather a grim way, and it had the effect of sending a cold streak of fear up and down the back of the meringue volunteer."Are they very difficult, mummy?" she asked apologetically."Oh, no," said Mrs. Leighton airily. "After mayonnaise, one may do anything.""I can whip cream--beautifully," explained Elma. "It's that queer crusty thing I'm afraid of.""I shall be ruined in eggs, I see that very distinctly," said Mrs. Leighton.After this, there seemed to be no proper opportunity for Betty."Couldn't I make a trifle?" she asked modestly. "A trifle at ten." Mrs. Leighton looked her over. "Oh! very well--Betty will make trifle."Betty looked as though she would drop into tears. Elma put her hand through her arm and whispered while the others debated about cakes, "I can find out all about trifles. Miss Grace knows. She made them cen--centuries ago, and Miss Annie never lets the new cooks try."Betty turned on her a happy face."Oh, Elma, you're most reviving," she said gratefully.Then they had cakes to consider. Now and again they had been allowed to bake cakes, and they felt that here they were on their own ground. Betty revived in a wonderful manner, and immediately insisted on baking a gingerbread one."Nobody eats gingerbread at parties," said Mabel in a disgusted voice. "This isn't a picnic we're arranging, or a school-room tea. It's a grown-up party, and we just aren't going to have gingerbread.""Yet I've sometimes thought that gingerbread at a party tasted very well," remarked Mrs. Leighton."Oh, mummy!" Mabel seemed very sorry for her mother.But Betty had regained her confidence."I shall bake gingerbread," she exclaimed in her most dogged manner."There are always the rabbits, of course," said Jean, with her nose in the air."Girls, girls," said Mrs. Leighton."Gingerbread one, walnut cream cake another. What will you bake, Jean?""Orange icing," quoth Jean."And sponge cake cream for Elma," she added in a thoughtful way."I do like the way you fling all the uninteresting things at me," exclaimed Elma. "I think sponge cake cream is the moistest, flabbiest, silliest cake I know. We're putting cream in everything. Everybody will be sick of cream. Why can't I bake a coffee cake?""Why can't she?" asked Mrs. Leighton severely."Coffee cake, Elma," said Mabel. She had taken to paper and pencil. "I only hope we shall know what it is when it appears!""And you'd better all begin as soon as you can," said Mrs. Leighton; "so that we find out where we are a few days before the party occurs."She still looked with foreboding on the whole arrangement.Cook preserved a hauteur on the subject of the invasion, through which the girls found it very hard to break."Never seed such a picnic," she informed the housemaid. "My, you should have been here when Miss Betty burned her gingerbread!"That was a sad occasion, and after all, there was nothing for it but the rabbits. Betty moaned over the lost raisins, the "ginger didn't count." "I stoned every one of them," she sighed. Mr. Leighton found some brown lumps in the rabbit hutches. "That's not the thing for these beasts," he said; "what is it?" And Betty explained that it would be quite safe for them, for (once more) hadn't she stoned every raisin herself?"I'm glad you're a millionaire, John," said Mrs. Leighton grimly when she heard about it.Elma made Betty try again. Elma's heart was in her mouth about her own performances, but she hung over Betty till a success was secured to the gingerbread. Then she couldn't get the kitchen for her coffee cake, because Mabs, in a neat white apron and sleeves, was ornamenting a ragged-looking structure of white icing with little dabs of pink, and trying to write "Cuthbert" in neat letters across the top. She had prepared a small cake--"just to taste it." They all tasted. It seemed rather crumply."Isn't there a good deal of walnut in it?" asked Mrs. Leighton humbly."It's nearly all walnut," said Mabel. "I like walnut."Jean worried along with her piece."Nobody will survive this party," said she.At last Elma's coffee cake got its innings. She was so nervous after the gingerbread fiasco that only the ultimate good humour of Cook saved her."Don't hurry over it, Miss Elma; it's coming nicely. I'll tell you when to stop beating."Nothing else would have guaranteed the existence of the cake. Cook also saw to the firing. This gave Elma such a delightful feeling of gratitude that she opened out her heart on the subject of meringues. Cook said that of course it was easy for them "as had never tried" just to rush in and make meringues the first thing. The likes of herself found them "kittlish" things. You may make meringues all your life, and then they'll go wrong for no reason at all. It was "knack" that was wanted principally."Do you think I've got knack, Cook?" asked Elma humbly.Cook gave her a clear night in the kitchen for the meringues, as a reward for her humility. It was marvellous that nearly all of them came fairly decently. Cook found the shapes "a bit queer," but "them as knew" who was providing the party wouldn't think they were "either here or there.""I'll make it up with the cream," quoth Elma happily. A great load was off her mind.She now devoted herself to Betty's trifle. As a great triumph they decided to provide a better trifle than even Cook knew how to prepare. Miss Grace entered heartily into the plan. They were allowed to call one morning when she was ensconced in the parlour. Saunders brought in solemnly, first, several sheets of white paper. These were laid very seriously on the bare finely-polished table. Then came a plate of sponge cake in neat slices, a thin custard in a glass jug, several little dishes, one of blanched almonds cut in long strips, another of halved cherries, one of tiny macaroon biscuits, and so on. Miss Grace set herself in a high chair, and proceedings began. Elma wondered to the end of her days what kind of a cook Miss Grace would have made if she had been paid for her work. Everything was prepared for Miss Grace, but she took an hour and a quarter to finish the trifle. She added custard in silver spoonfuls as though each one had a definite effect of its own, and she several times measured the half glassful of cordial which was apportioned to each layer of sponge cake. The ceremony seemed interminable. Elma saw how true it was what her father often said, that one ought always to have a big enough object in life to keep one from paying too much importance to trifles. She immediately afterwards apologized to herself for the pun, which, she explained in that half world of dreaming to which she so often resorted, she hadn't at all intended.Elma and Betty, however, to the end of their days, never forgot how to make trifle.Betty's trifle was a magnificent success.Jean engaged a whole fruiterer's shop, as it seemed, for her salad, and found she made enough for forty people out of a fourth of what she had ordered. This put Mrs. Leighton back into her old prophetic position. Had she not told Jean a quarter of that fruit would be enough?Mabel arranged everything in good order for her chicken concoction, and at last had only the mayonnaise to make. That occurred on the afternoon of the party. Cuthbert and Harry and Mr. Maclean were all about--supposed to be helping. May Turberville, Betty's great friend, and her brother Lance, a boy of fourteen, brought round various loans in the way of cups and cream and sugar "things." The table in the dining-room was laid for supper with a most dainty centre-piece decked with roses and candelabra. Most of their labours being over, the company retreated to the smoke-room, where "high jinks" were soon in process. Lance capered about, balancing chairs on his nose, and doing the wild things which only take place in a smoke-room.In the midst of it appeared Mabel, wide-eyed and distressed, at the door. The white apron of a few days ago was smeared with little elongated drops of oily stuff. She held a fork wildly dripping in her hand."Oh--oh, isn't it awful," she cried, "the mayonnaise won't may."It was the last anxiety, and, in the matter of the pints of the Leighton girls, quite the last straw. Just when they had begun to be confident of their party, the real backbone of the thing had given out.Dr. Harry removed a cigarette from his lips."Hey--what's that?" he asked. "Mayonnaise--ripping! I knew an American Johnnie who made it. Bring it here, and we'll put it right."Mabel spread her hands mutely. "In this atmosphere?" she asked.Oh! They had soon the windows open. Harry insisted he could make mayonnaise. "You don't meet American men for nothing, let me tell you," he said. It was fun to see him supplied with plate, fork and bottles. He looked at Mabel's attempt at dressing."Good gracious!" he said, "where's the egg?"Mabel turned rather faint. "I put in the white," said she.Dr. Harry roared. Then he explained carefully and kindly."Mayonnaise is an interesting affair--apart from the joys of eating it. A chemical action takes place between the yoke of an egg and the oil and vinegar. You could hardly expect the white to play up.""It was Cook," exclaimed Mabel. "She said something about yokes for a custard and whites for--for----""Meringues, you donkey," said Jean.Dr. Harry made the mayonnaise.Lance Turberville cut the most shameful capers throughout. He decorated Harry with paper aprons and the cap of a chef, and stuck his eyeglass in the wrong eye while Harry worked patiently with a fork in semicircles. He was sent off with Betty and May, only to reappear later dressed out as a maid-servant. Nobody except Dr. Harry could take the mayonnaise seriously while Lance was about. At that moment the outdoor bell rang. With the inspiration born of mischief, and before any one could stop him, Lance rushed off and opened it.Three ladies stood on the doorstep.He showed them solemnly into the drawing-room, tripping over his skirt merely a trifle, and nearly giving Bertha, who had primly come to attend to the door, hysterics. He advanced to the smoke-room, where the mayonnaise was nearly completed."Mrs. and Miss Dudgeon and Miss Steven are in the drawing-room," said Lance.CHAPTER VIIVisitors AgainBy itself an occurrence like this would have been unnerving enough. Visitors on the afternoon of a party, and such visitors! But that the Leightons should all be more or less in a pickle in regard to the mayonnaise and Lance's foolery seemed to take things altogether over the barrier of ordinary life, and land everybody in a perfect fizzle. The Dudgeons must have called to see Cuthbert, who had never been down yet on these occasions when Mrs. Leighton and Mabel and Jean with perfect propriety had received them. Mabel had had her innings as the eldest of the house, but had retained an enormous reserve when speaking to Miss Dudgeon. Not so Jean, who believed in getting to know people at once. Elma and Betty had never ventured near them since that dreadful day when they all did the wrong thing at the wrong moment."Anyhow, the drawing-room is a perfect dream with flowers. They can look at that for a bit," said Jean, as they began to remove the regiment of bottles. Dr. Harry's mayonnaise was creamy and perfect, and Mabel was in high fettle correspondingly."Do you know," she said, "I don't care tuppence for the Dudgeons just now. Let's go in and give them a decent reception for once." It reflected the feeling of all, that nothing could disturb their gaiety on this day.Elma was reminded again how right her father was in declaring that once one had an absorbing object in front of one, trifles dwindled down to their proper level. Why should any of them be afraid of the Story Books? Certainly not at all, on a day when they were about to have a ripping party, and the mayonnaise at last had "mayed." Cuthbert gave a big jolly laugh at Mabel's speech."Come along, all of you," he said. "What about those oily fingers of yours, Harry? What a jewel of a husband you'll be! You, Lance, get off these togs and behave yourself."Lance promised abjectly to be an ornament to the household for the rest of the afternoon. Something in his look as he went off reminded Mabel of other promises of Lance."Be good," she called out to him."Yes, mother," exclaimed Lance, evidently at work already tearing off the skirt, and looking demure and mournful. He seemed very ridiculous still, and they went off merrily to the drawing-room."Cuthbert," whispered Elma, "I'm so frightened. Take me in.""I'm frightened too," whispered Cuthbert.This made her laugh, so that as she held on to his arm she approached Adelaide Maud in admirable spirits. The party invaded the drawing-room as a flood would invade it--or so it seemed to the Dudgeons, who were talking quietly to Mrs. Leighton. The whole room sprouted Leightons. Mrs. Dudgeon resorted entirely to her lorgnette, especially when she shook hands with Cuthbert. He stood that ordeal bravely, also the ordeal of the speech that followed."You see the two very shy members of the family," he said, bowing gravely and disregarding some sarcastic laughter from the background. "May I introduce my young sister Elma."Here was honour for Elma. She shook hands with crimson cheeks. Then came Adelaide Maud. She gave her hand to Cuthbert without a word, but when Elma's turn came she said with rather sweet gravity, "This is the little lady, isn't it, who plays to Miss Grace?"Elma was thunderstruck; but Cuthbert, the magnificent, seemed very pleased."Oh--Miss Grace didn't tell you?" asked Elma."No, I heard you one day, and Miss Annie told me it was you."Adelaide Maud sat down on a low chair, and drew Elma on to the arm."What was it you were playing?" she asked."One is called 'Anything you like,' and one is 'A little thing of my own,' and the others are just anything," said Elma.Adelaide Maud laughed.The room was filled with chattering voices, and Mrs. Dudgeon had claimed Cuthbert, so that it became a very easy thing for them to be confidential without any one's noticing."It's quite stup--stup----" Elma stopped."Stupid?" asked Adelaide Maud."No, stup-endous," said Elma thankfully, "for me to be talking all alone with you." Her fright had run away, as it always did whenever any one looked kindly at her. The sweet eyes of Adelaide Maud disarmed her, and she worshipped on the spot. "I've always been so afraid of you," she said simply. "It ought to be Hermione, but I know it will always be you.""Who is Hermione?" asked Adelaide Maud.Elma suddenly woke up."Oh, I daren't tell you," said she.Adelaide Maud looked about her in a constrained way."I wish you would play to me, dear," she said.Was this really to be believed!"I could in the schoolroom," said Elma, "but not here.""Take me to the schoolroom," said Adelaide Maud.Elma placed her hand in that of the other delicately gloved one without a tremor."Don't let them see us go," she begged.Three people did, however: Cuthbert with a bounding heart, Mabel with thankfulness that the house was really in exhibition order, and Jean with blank amazement. Elma had walked off in ten minutes intimately with the flower that Jean had, as it were, been tending carefully for weeks, and had not dared to pluck. There was something of the dark horse about Elma.They were much taken up with Miss Steven however. She was very fair and petite, and had pretty ways of curving herself and throwing back her head, and of spreading her hands when she talked. She seemed to like to have the eyes of the room fixed on her. Quite different from the Dudgeons, who in about two ticks stared one out of looking at them at all. Mr. Leighton came in also, and what might be called her last thaw was undergone by Mrs. Dudgeon in the pleasure of meeting him. If she had her ideas on beaded cushions, she had certainly no objections to Mr. Leighton. In five minutes he was explaining to her that sea trout are to be discovered in fresh water lakes at certain seasons of the year.Unfortunately, just then Mrs. Dudgeon happened to look out of the windows. There were three long ones, and each opened out on that sunny day to the lawn at the side of the house. If Mrs. Dudgeon had kept her eye on the Louis Seize clock or the famous Monticelli, all might have gone well, but she preferred to look out of the window. In spite of the general hilarity of the party around her, her action in looking out seemed to impress them all. Everybody except Mr. Leighton looked out also, and then came an ominous silence.Mr. Maclean giggled.This formed a link to a burst of conversation. Jean turned to Miss Steven and engaged her in a whirlwind of talk. Cuthbert vainly endeavoured to move the stony glance of Mrs. Dudgeon once more in the direction of his father. Dr. Harry wildly asked Mabel to play something.Mabel never forgave him.Mrs. Dudgeon immediately became preternaturally polite, said she had often heard of the musical proclivities of the Misses Leighton, and Mabel had really to play."Oh, Harry," she exclaimed, "I never played with a burden like this on my mind, never in all my life. The party to-night--and that mayonnaise (it will keep maying, won't it?)--and Elma goodness knows where with Adelaide Maud, and those kids in the garden--couldn't Cuthbert go and slay them?"She dashed into a Chopin polonaise.The kids in the garden were what had upset Mrs. Dudgeon. There were two--evidently playing "catch me if you can" with one of the maid-servants--the one who had shown them in. She rushed about in a manner which looked very mad. This exhibition on the drawing-room side of the house! Really--these middle class people!Mrs. Dudgeon extended the lorgnette to looking at them once more.A horizontal bar was erected in a corner of the lawn. Towards this the eccentric maid-servant seemed to be making determined passes, frantically prevented every now and again by the two young girls. The chords of the "railway polonaise" hammered out a violent accompaniment. Mabel could play magnificently when in a rage. Little Miss Steven was enchanted.Nearer came the maid-servant to the horizontal bar. At last she reached it. May and Betty sat down plump on the lawn in silent despair. Lance pulled himself gently and gracefully up. Not content with getting there, he kissed his hand to the unresponsive drawing-room windows. To do him justice, there was little sign for him that any one saw him, and Mabel's piano playing seemed to envelop everything. He did some graceful things towards the end of the polonaise, but with the last chords became violently mischievous again. With a wild whirl he turned a partial somersault. Mrs. Dudgeon shrieked. "Oh, that woman," said she. Just then Lance stopped his whirlings and sent his feet straight into the air. His skirts fell gracefully over his face. Dr. Harry laughed a loud laugh, and at last Mr. Leighton asked what was the matter."It's Lance," said Jean. "He has been playing tricks all the afternoon."Everything might have been forgiven except that Mrs. Dudgeon had been taken in. She had screamed, "That woman."She began to look about for Adelaide Maud."Will you be so kind as to tell my daughter that we must be going," she said to Mr. Leighton.Cuthbert volunteered to look for her.Dr. Harry really did the neat thing. He went out for Lance and brought him in with Betty and May. He hauled Lance by the ear to Mrs. Dudgeon."Here you see a culprit of the deepest dye."Lance looked very rosy and mischievous, and Miss Steven, who had been immersed in hysterical laughter since his exploit on the bar, was delighted with him."I am so sorry," said Lance gravely, encouraged by this appreciation, "but I promised mother that I should be an ornament to the company this afternoon.""Oh, Lance," said May, "how can you!""By 'mother,' of course I mean Mabel," said Lance to Mrs. Dudgeon in an explanatory fashion. "She has grown so cocky since she put her hair up."Mrs. Dudgeon determined to give up trying to unravel the middle classes.Mr. Maclean broke in. "Everybody spoils Lance, Mrs. Dudgeon. It isn't quite his own fault; look at Miss Steven."Miss Steven, always prompt to appreciate a person's wickedest mood, had made an immediate friend of Lance."They are a great trial to us, these young people," said Mr. Leighton gently.The speech wafted her back to her gracious mood, and for a little while longer she forgot that she had sent for Adelaide Maud.Meanwhile Cuthbert endeavoured to discover what had happened to that "delicious" person.With swishing skirts, and gleam of golden hair under a white hat, Elma had seen herself escort Adelaide Maud from the drawing-room to the schoolroom. Adelaide Maud sat on a hassock in the room where "You don't mean to say you were all babies," and Elma played "Anything you like" to her.Adelaide Maud's face became of the dreamy far-away consistency of Miss Grace's--without the cap, and Elma felt her cup of happiness run over."Does your sister play like that?" asked Adelaide Maud."Far better," said Elma simply.They heard the bars of the railway polonaise, and the schoolroom, being just over the drawing-room, they had also the full benefit of Lance's exploit.Adelaide Maud laughed and laughed."Oh, what will Mrs. Dudgeon say?" asked Elma.She told Adelaide Maud about the party, a frightful "breach of etiquette," as Mabel informed her later. Adelaide Maud's face grew serious and rather sad."What a pity you live in another ph--phrase of society," sighed Elma, "or you would be coming too, wouldn't you?""Would you really ask me?" asked Adelaide Maud.Ask her?Did Adelaide Maud think that if the world were made of gold and one could help one's self to it, one wouldn't have a little piece now and again! She was just about to explain that they would do anything in the world to ask her, when Cuthbert came into the room. Adelaide Maud got so stiff at that moment, that immediately Elma understood that it would never do to ask her to the party.Cuthbert explained that Mrs. Dudgeon had sent him to fetch Miss Dudgeon."Oh," said Adelaide Maud.She did not make the slightest move towards leaving, however.She looked straight at Cuthbert, and Elma could have sworn she saw her lip quiver."I believe I have to apologize to you," she said in a very cold voice. "I cut out a dance, didn't I--at the Calthorps'!""Did you?" asked Cuthbert.Elma wondered that he could be so negligent in speaking to Adelaide Maud. She never could bear to see Cuthbert severe, and it had the effect of terrifying her a trifle and making her take the hand of Adelaide Maud in a defensive sort of manner.Adelaide Maud held her hand quite tightly, as though Elma were really a friend of some standing."I didn't intend to, but I know it seemed like it," said Adelaide Maud in perfectly freezing tones.Cuthbert looked at her very directly, and seemed to answer the freezing side more than the apologizing one."Oh--a small thing of that sort, what does it matter"? he said grandly.Adelaide Maud turned quite pale."Thank you," said she. "It's quite sweet of you to take it like that," and she marched out of the schoolroom with her skirts swishing and her head high. No--it would never do to invite Adelaide Maud to the party.Elma however had seen another side to this very dignified lady, and so ran after her and took her hand again."You aren't vexed with me, are you?" she whispered.Adelaide Maud at the turn of the stairs, and just at the point where Cuthbert, coming savagely behind, could not see, bent and kissed Elma."What day do you go to Miss Grace's?" she asked."To-morrow at three," whispered Elma, with her plans quite suddenly arranged."Don't tell," said Adelaide Maud, "I shall be there."Mrs. Dudgeon departed with appropriate graciousness. The irrepressible gaiety of the company round her had merely served to make her more unapproachable. She greeted Adelaide Maud with a stare, and strove to make her immediate adieus. Mr. Maclean, always ready to notice a deficiency, remembered that Mr. Leighton had never met Adelaide Maud, and forthwith introduced her. Adelaide Maud took this introduction shyly, and Mr. Leighton was charmed with her. With an unfaltering estimate of character he appraised her then as being one in a hundred amongst girls. Adelaide Maud, on her part, showed him gentle little asides to her nature which one could not have believed existed. Mrs. Dudgeon grew really impatient at the constant interruptions which impeded her exit."Mr. Leighton has just been telling me," she said by way of getting out of the drawing-room, "that a little party is to be celebrated here to-night. I fear we detain you all." Nothing could have been more gracious--and yet! Mabel flushed. It seemed so like a children's affair--that they should be having a party, and that the really important people were actually clearing out in order to allow it to occur.Miss Steven said farewell with real regret."I don't know when I have had such a jolly afternoon," she said. "I think I must get knocked over oftener. Though I don't want Mr. Leighton to break his ribs every time. Do you know," she said in a most heart-breaking manner, "I've been hardly able to breathe for thinking of it. You can't think how nice it is to see you all so jolly after all."When they had got into the Dudgeons' carriage, and were rolling swiftly homewards, she yawned a trifle."What cures they are," she said airily.Adelaide Maud, in her silent corner of the carriage, felt her third pang of that memorable afternoon.CHAPTER VIIIThe PartyNobody knew how anybody got dressed for the party, and certainly nobody took any dinner to speak of. It was laid in the morning-room, and Mr. Leighton said throughout that roystering meal that never again, no matter how many ribs Cuthbert broke or how much sympathy he excited, would he allow them to have a party.The occasion became memorable, not only because of Cuthbert or the mayonnaise, or the Dudgeons, but because on that night Robin Meredith appeared. Mabel and Jean lately had already in quite a practical manner begun to wonder whom Mabel would be obliged to marry. Jean was getting very tall, and showed signs of being so near the grown-up stage herself, that she was anxious to see Mabel disposed of, so as to leave the way clear."The eldest of four ought to look sharp," she declared; "we can't allow any trifling."This seemed rather overwhelming treatment of Mabel, who was only seventeen. But viewed from that age, even a girl of twenty-one is sometimes voted an old maid, and Mabel was quite determined not to become an old maid."There seems to be only George Maclean," she had sighed in a dismal way. She was quite different from Elma, who continually dreamed of a duke. George Maclean would do very well for Mabel, only, as Jean complained, "George Maclean is a gentleman and all that kind of thing, but he has no prospects." So they rather disposed of George Maclean, for immediate purposes at least. Then came Mr. Meredith. After that, in the language of the Leightons, it was all up with Mabel. She would simply have to get engaged and married to Mr. Meredith.Mr. Meredith was of middle height, with rather a square, fair face, and a short cut-away dark moustache. He spoke in a bright concise sort of way, and darted very quick glances at people when addressing them. He came in with the Gardiners, and after shaking hands with Mrs. Leighton he darted several quick glances round the room, and then asked abruptly of Lucy Gardiner "Who was the tall girl in white?"Here was the point where the fortunes of the Leighton girls became at last crystallized, concrete. It is all very well to dream, but it is much pleasanter to be sure that something is really about to happen.None of this undercurrent was noticeable, however, in the general behaviour of that imaginative four. They began the evening in a dignified way with music. Every one either sang or played. Jean in her usual hearty fashion dashed through a "party piece." Even Elma was obliged to play the Boccherini Minuet, which she did with the usual nervous blunders.As Dr. Harry placed the music ready for her, she whispered to him, "Whenever I lift my heels off the floor, my knees knock against each other.""Keep your heels down," said Dr. Harry with the immobile air of a commanding officer.Elma found the piano pedals, and in the fine desire to follow out Dr. Harry's instructions played Boccherini with both pedals down throughout."How you do improve, Elma!" said May Turberville politely.And Elma looked at her with a mute despair in her eyes of which hours of laughter could not rid them. If only they knew, those people in that room, if only they knew what she wanted to play, the melodies that came singing in her heart when she was happy, the minor things when she was sad! All she could do when people were collected to stare at her was to play the Boccherini Minuet exceedingly badly. The weight of "evenings" had begun already to rest on Elma. Her undoubted gifts at learning and understanding music brought her into sharp prominence with her teachers and family, but never enabled Elma to exhibit herself with advantage on any real occasion.It was all the more inexplicable that Mabel could at once dash into anything with abandon and perfect correctness. Technique and understanding seemed born in her. In the same way could she, light-heartedly and gracefully, take the new homage of Mr. Meredith, who made no secret of his interest in her from the first moment of entering the drawing-room. Mabel received him as she received a Sonata by Beethoven. With fleet fingers she could read the one as though she had practised it all her life; with dainty manners she seemed to comprehend Mr. Meredith from the start, as though she had been accustomed to refusing and accepting desirable husbands from time immemorial. It put her on a new footing with the rest of the girls. They felt in quite a decided way, within a few days even, that the old, rather childish fashion of talking about husbands was to be dropped, and that no jokes were to be perpetrated in regard to Mr. Meredith. It began to be no fun at all having an eligible sister in the house.On this night, however, they were still children. About forty young people, school friends of themselves and Cuthbert, sustained that gaiety with which they had begun the afternoon. Even the musical part, where Mr. Leighton presided and encouraged young girls with no musical talents whatever to play and sing, passed with a certain amount of lightness. Before an interlude of charades, a strange girl was shown in. She giggled behind an enormous fan, and made a great show of canary-coloured curls in the process. She seemed to have on rather skimpy skirts, and she showed in a lumbering way rather large shiny patent shoes with flat boys' bows on them.There was a moment of indecision before Betty broke out with the remark, "You might have had the sense to hide your feet, Lance."The canary-coloured curls enabled Lance to look becomingly foolish. In any case, Mr. Leighton could not prevent the intellectual part of the evening from falling to bits. They had no more real music. Instead, they fell on Lance and borrowed his curls, and made some good charades till supper time."I can't help feeling very rocky about that supper," whispered Jean to Mabel. "Yet we've everything--sandwiches, cake, fruit and lemonade, tea and coffee. What can go wrong now?""Oh! the thing's all right," said Mabel, who was in a severely exalted mood by this time.They trooped into the dining-room, where girls were provided in a crushy way with seats round the room, and boys ran about and handed them things. Mrs. Leighton gave the head of the table to Mabel, who sat in an elderly way and poured coffee. The salad was magnificent. Aunt Katharine had come in "to look on." Mrs. Leighton told her how Mabel had arranged forty-two plates that morning, with water-lily tomatoes cut ready and chopped chicken in the centres, and had nearly driven Cook silly with the shelves she used for storing these things in cool places."Wherever you looked--miles and miles of little plates with red water lilies," said Mrs. Leighton. "It was most distracting for Cook. I wonder the woman stays.""What a mess," said Aunt Katharine. "You spoil these girls, you know, Lucy.""Oh--it's Mr. Leighton," said she sadly."I don't think mayonnaise is a very suitable thing for young people's parties," said Aunt Katharine dingily.By this time the white cake with "Cuthbert" in pink was handed solemnly round. Every person had a large piece, it looked so good.Every one said, "Walnut, how lovely," when they took the first bite.Every one stopped at the second bite."Cuthbert," called out Mrs. Leighton after she had investigated her own piece, "I notice that your father has none of the cake. Please take him a slice and see that he eats it."Mr. Leighton waved it away."I do not eat walnuts," said he.Mrs. Leighton went to him."John, this is not fair, this is your idea of a party," she said. "You ought to eat Cuthbert's cake.""He can't," cried Jean; "nobody can. It's only Mabel who likes iced marbles.""You will all have to eat gingerbread," said the voice of Betty hopefully.Jean started up in great indignation with a large battered-looking "orange iced cake" ready to cut."Betty always gets herself advertized first," she complained. "Please try my orange icing."They did--they tried anything in order to escape Mabel's walnuts. It occurred to the girls that Mabel would be quite broken up at the wretched failure of her wonderful cake--the Cuthbert cake too. It was such a drop from their high pedestal of perfection. Even mummy, who had been so much on her own high horse at all their successes, now became quite feelingly sorry about the cake. She gave directions for having the loose pieces collected and surreptitiously put out of sight, but the large dish had to remain in front of Mabel. Mabel was still charmingly occupied over her coffee cups. She poured in a pretty direct way and yet managed to talk interestedly to Mr. Meredith. He was invaluable as a helper."And now, at last," said she in a most winning manner, "you must have a slice of my cake. I baked it myself, and it's full of walnuts. Don't you love walnuts?""I do," said Mr. Meredith.May Turberville nudged Betty, and Lance stared open-mouthed at the courage of Mabel. He would do a good deal for the Leighton girls, but he barred that particular cake. An electric feeling of comprehension ran round the company. They seemed to know that Mabel was about to taste her own cake and give a large slice to Mr. Meredith. They made little airy remarks to one another in order to keep the conversation going, so that Mabel might not detect by some sudden pause that every one was watching her. One heard Julia Gardiner say in an intense manner to Harry Somerton that the begonias at Mrs. Somerton's were a "perfect dream." And Harry answered that for his part he liked football better. Even Mr. Leighton noticed the trend of things, and stopped discussing higher morality with Aunt Katharine.Mabel seemed to take an interminable time. She gave Mr. Meredith a large piece, and insisted besides on serving him with an unwieldy lump of pink icing containing a large scrawly "e" from the last syllable of Cuthbert's name."E--aw," brayed Lance gently, and Betty exploded into a long series of helpless giggles."What a baby you are, Lance," said Mabel, amiably laughing. She bit daintily at the walnut cake.Mr. Meredith bit largely.There was an enormous pause while they waited to see what he would do.Cuthbert and Ronald Martin were near, aimlessly handing trifle and fruit salad. Mr. Meredith helped with one hand to pass a cup."You know, Leighton," he said, "I have a great friend, he was one of your year--Vincent Hope--do you remember him?"Cuthbert stared. One mouthful was gone and Mr. Meredith was cheerfully gulping another."What a digestion the man has," he thought, and next was plunged politely in reminiscent conversation regarding his College days.Mabel sat crunching quite happily at the despised walnut cake.Lance approached her timidly."For Heaven's sake," he said, "give me a large cup of coffee for the ostrich. The man will die if he isn't helped.""Who on earth do you mean, Lance?" asked Mabel innocently."Meredith. Don't you see he has eaten the cake."Mabel looked conscience-stricken. Her own slice had not dwindled much."It is rather chucky-stoney, isn't it?" she asked anxiously."It's terrific," said Lance sagely.Mabel looked quite crushed for a moment, so crushed that even Lance's mischievous heart relented."Never mind, Mabel," he comforted her. "If Meredith can do that much for you without a shudder, he will do anything. It's a splendid test."A golden maxim of Mrs. Leighton's flashed into Mabel's mind, "You never know a man till he has been tried." It made her smile to think that already they might be supposed to be getting to know Mr. Meredith because of her villainous cake."The piece we tested wasn't so bad," she explained to Lance, quite forgetting that she had skimmed that quantity in order to get plenty of chopped walnuts into the "real" cake.A few people in the room seemed fearfully amused, and poor Mabel in an undefined manner began to feel decidedly out of it. Lance went about like a conspirator, commenting on the appearance of "the ostrich." He approached Cuthbert, asking him in an anxious manner how long the signs of rapid poisoning might be expected to take to declare themselves after a quadruple dose of walnut cake. Mr. Meredith unruffled, still handed about cups for Mabel.Jean was in a corner with her dearest friend Maud Hartley."Isn't it wonderful what love can do?" she remarked quite seriously. It was a curious thing that Elma, who dreamed silly dreams about far-away things, and was despised for this accordingly by the robust Jean, did not become romantic over Mr. Meredith at all. She merely thought that he must be fearfully fond of walnuts.The supper was hardly a pleasure to her--or to Betty. Every dish was an anxiety. They could almost count the plates for the different courses in their desire to know whether each had been successfully disposed of. There was no doubt about the trifle."What a pity Mabel didn't make it," sighed Jean. After all, Mabel had only inspired the chicken salad, and even there Dr. Harry had made the mayonnaise."It isn't much of a start for her with Mr. Meredith," she sighed dismally, "if only we hadn't told anybody which was which."Mr. Meredith took a large amount of trifle, praising it considerably.This alarmed Lance more than ever."One good thing does not destroy a bad thing," he exclaimed. "The first axiom to be learned in chemistry is that one smell does not kill another. It is a popular delusion that it does. Meredith seems to have been brought up on popular lines."He posed in front of Cuthbert with his hands in his pockets."We are running a great risk," said he. "To-morrow morning Meredith may be saying things about your sisters which may prevent us men from being friends with him--for ever."Above the general flood of conversation, Aunt Katharine's treble voice might now be heard."Mabel," she said in a kind manner, "I must compliment you. When your mother told me about this ridiculous party, I told her she was spoiling you as she always does. In my young days we weren't allowed to be extravagant and experiment in cooking whenever a party occurred. We began with the 'common round, the daily task.'" Aunt Katharine sighed heavily. "But I never knew you could make a trifle like this."Mabel had been sitting like the others, trying to subdue the merriment which Aunt Katharine's long speeches usually aroused. The wind-up to this tirade alarmed her however. She would have to tell them all, with Mr. Meredith standing there, that the trifle was not her trifle. She would have to say that it was Betty's.Before she could open her mouth however, the whole loyal regiment of Leightons had forestalled her."Isn't it a jolly trifle!" they exclaimed. Mabel could even hear Betty's little pipe joining in."Oh, but I must tell you," she began.Cuthbert appeared at the doorway."Drawing-room cleared for dancing," said he. "Come along."That finished it, and the girls were delighted with themselves. But one little melancholy thing, for all her partisanship, disturbed Jean considerably. Mr. Meredith, on giving his arm to Mabel for the first dance, was heard distinctly to remark, "You make all these delicious things as well as play piano! How clever of you."And Mabel looking perfectly possessed floated round to the first waltz as though she had not made a complete muddle of the walnut cake.Jean did not regret their generosity, but she was saddened by it."It all comes of being the eldest," she confided to Maud, "We may stand on our heads now if we like, but if anything distinguished happens in the family, Mabel will get the credit of it."
CHAPTER VI
The Mayonnaise
The girls gave a party to celebrate the recovery of Cuthbert. They were allowed to do this on one condition, that they made everything for it themselves.
This was Mr. Leighton's idea, and it found rapturous approval in the ranks of the family, and immediate rebellion in the heart of Mrs. Leighton. It was her one obstinacy that she should retain full hold of the reins of housekeeping. Once let a lot of girls into the kitchen, and where are you?
"Once let a lot of girls grow up with no kind of responsibility in life, and where are you then?" asked Mr. Leighton. "I don't want my girls to drift. No man is really healthy unless he is striving after something, if it's only after finding a new kind of beetle. I don't see how a girl can be healthy without a definite occupation."
"They make their beds, and they have their music," sighed Mrs. Leighton. "Girls in my day didn't interfere with the housekeeping."
"I've thought about their music," said Mr. Leighton. "I'm glad they have it. But it isn't life, you know. A drawing-room accomplishment isn't life. I want them to be equipped all round. Not just by taking classes either. Classes end by making people willing to be taught, but the experiences of life make them very swift to learn. We can't have them sitting dreaming about husbands for ever. Dreams and ideals are all very well, but one scamps the realities if one goes on at them too long. Elma means to marry a duke, you know. Isn't it much better that in the meantime she should learn to make a salad?"
"The servants will be so cross," said Mrs. Leighton. She invariably saw readily enough where she must give in, but on these occasions she never gave in except with outward great unwillingness.
"Oh, perhaps not," said Mr. Leighton. "They have dull enough lives themselves. I'm sure it will be rather fun for them to see Mabel making cakes."
"Mabel can't make cakes," exclaimed Mrs. Leighton. Her professional talents were really being questioned here. Throughout the length and breadth of the country, nobody made cakes like Mrs. Leighton.
Mr. Leighton grew a little bit testy.
"You know, my dear, if this house were a business concern it would be your duty to take your eldest daughter into partnership at this stage. As it is, you seem to want to keep her out for ever."
Mrs. Leighton sighed heavily.
"That's just it, John," said she; "I want to keep her out for ever. I want them all to remain little children, and myself being mother to them. Since Mabel got her hair up--already it's different. I feel in an underhand sort of way that I'm being run by my own daughter--I really do."
"More like by your own son," said Mr. Leighton. "The way you give in to that boy is a disgrace."
"Oh, Cuthbert's different," said Mrs. Leighton brightly.
"Poor Mabel," smiled Mr. Leighton.
It was an old subject with them, thrashed out again and again, ever since Cuthbert as a rather spoiled child of seven had had his little nose put out of joint by the first arrival of girls in the imperious person of Mabel. Mrs. Leighton had always felt a little grieved with the absurdly rapid manner in which Mr. Leighton's affections had gone over to Mabel.
"In any case, try them with the party," said he. "The only thing that can happen is for the cook to give notice."
"And I shall have to get another one, of course." Mrs. Leighton's voice dwelt in a suspiciously marked manner on the pronoun.
"Now there's another opportunity for making use of Mabel," said her husband.
Mrs. Leighton let her hands fall.
"Engage my own servants! What next?" she asked.
"Oh, I don't know," said he. "Cuthbert does heaps of things for me. You women are the true conservatives. If we had you in power there would be no chance for the country."
"Well, you might have persuaded Cuthbert to succeed you as Chairman of your Company, with a steady income and all that sort of thing," she exclaimed, "instead of rushing him into a profession which keeps him tied night and day, and gives him no return as yet for all his work."
"I should never stand in the way of enthusiasm," said her husband. "Cuthbert has a real genius for his profession."
"Then why not find a profession for Mabel?"
"I have thought of that. It seems right, however, that a man ought to be equipped for one profession, and a girl for several. I can always leave my girls enough money to keep the wolf from the door at least. I have an objection to any girl being obliged to work entirely for her living. Men ought to relieve them of that at least. But we must give them occupation; work that develops. Come, come, my dear; you must let them have their head a little, even although they ruin the cakes. A good mother makes useless daughters, you know."
"Well, it's a wrench, John."
"There, there," he smiled at her.
"And the servants are sure to give notice."
She regretted much of her pessimism, however, when she gave the news to the girls. Not for a long time had they been so animated. Each took her one department in the supper menu prepared under the guidance of Mrs. Leighton.
First, chicken salad inserted into a tomato, cut into water-lily shape, reposing on lettuce leaves--one on each little plate, mayonnaise dressing on top.
The mayonnaise captured Mabel.
"But you can't make it, it's a most trying thing to do--better let cook make it," interjected Mrs. Leighton.
"What about our party?" asked Mabel.
"Very well," said an abject mother.
So that was settled.
Then fruit salad, immediately claimed by Jean, who knew everything there was to be known of fruit, inside and out, as she explained volubly. Mrs. Leighton's quiet face twitched a trifle and then resolved itself into business lines once more.
Meringues! they must have meringues! Nobody seemed to rise to that. Elma felt it was her turn.
"They look awfully difficult," said she, "but I could try a day or two before. I'll do the meringues."
This cost her a great effort. Mother didn't appear at all encouraging, She snipped her lips together in rather a grim way, and it had the effect of sending a cold streak of fear up and down the back of the meringue volunteer.
"Are they very difficult, mummy?" she asked apologetically.
"Oh, no," said Mrs. Leighton airily. "After mayonnaise, one may do anything."
"I can whip cream--beautifully," explained Elma. "It's that queer crusty thing I'm afraid of."
"I shall be ruined in eggs, I see that very distinctly," said Mrs. Leighton.
After this, there seemed to be no proper opportunity for Betty.
"Couldn't I make a trifle?" she asked modestly. "A trifle at ten." Mrs. Leighton looked her over. "Oh! very well--Betty will make trifle."
Betty looked as though she would drop into tears. Elma put her hand through her arm and whispered while the others debated about cakes, "I can find out all about trifles. Miss Grace knows. She made them cen--centuries ago, and Miss Annie never lets the new cooks try."
Betty turned on her a happy face.
"Oh, Elma, you're most reviving," she said gratefully.
Then they had cakes to consider. Now and again they had been allowed to bake cakes, and they felt that here they were on their own ground. Betty revived in a wonderful manner, and immediately insisted on baking a gingerbread one.
"Nobody eats gingerbread at parties," said Mabel in a disgusted voice. "This isn't a picnic we're arranging, or a school-room tea. It's a grown-up party, and we just aren't going to have gingerbread."
"Yet I've sometimes thought that gingerbread at a party tasted very well," remarked Mrs. Leighton.
"Oh, mummy!" Mabel seemed very sorry for her mother.
But Betty had regained her confidence.
"I shall bake gingerbread," she exclaimed in her most dogged manner.
"There are always the rabbits, of course," said Jean, with her nose in the air.
"Girls, girls," said Mrs. Leighton.
"Gingerbread one, walnut cream cake another. What will you bake, Jean?"
"Orange icing," quoth Jean.
"And sponge cake cream for Elma," she added in a thoughtful way.
"I do like the way you fling all the uninteresting things at me," exclaimed Elma. "I think sponge cake cream is the moistest, flabbiest, silliest cake I know. We're putting cream in everything. Everybody will be sick of cream. Why can't I bake a coffee cake?"
"Why can't she?" asked Mrs. Leighton severely.
"Coffee cake, Elma," said Mabel. She had taken to paper and pencil. "I only hope we shall know what it is when it appears!"
"And you'd better all begin as soon as you can," said Mrs. Leighton; "so that we find out where we are a few days before the party occurs."
She still looked with foreboding on the whole arrangement.
Cook preserved a hauteur on the subject of the invasion, through which the girls found it very hard to break.
"Never seed such a picnic," she informed the housemaid. "My, you should have been here when Miss Betty burned her gingerbread!"
That was a sad occasion, and after all, there was nothing for it but the rabbits. Betty moaned over the lost raisins, the "ginger didn't count." "I stoned every one of them," she sighed. Mr. Leighton found some brown lumps in the rabbit hutches. "That's not the thing for these beasts," he said; "what is it?" And Betty explained that it would be quite safe for them, for (once more) hadn't she stoned every raisin herself?
"I'm glad you're a millionaire, John," said Mrs. Leighton grimly when she heard about it.
Elma made Betty try again. Elma's heart was in her mouth about her own performances, but she hung over Betty till a success was secured to the gingerbread. Then she couldn't get the kitchen for her coffee cake, because Mabs, in a neat white apron and sleeves, was ornamenting a ragged-looking structure of white icing with little dabs of pink, and trying to write "Cuthbert" in neat letters across the top. She had prepared a small cake--"just to taste it." They all tasted. It seemed rather crumply.
"Isn't there a good deal of walnut in it?" asked Mrs. Leighton humbly.
"It's nearly all walnut," said Mabel. "I like walnut."
Jean worried along with her piece.
"Nobody will survive this party," said she.
At last Elma's coffee cake got its innings. She was so nervous after the gingerbread fiasco that only the ultimate good humour of Cook saved her.
"Don't hurry over it, Miss Elma; it's coming nicely. I'll tell you when to stop beating."
Nothing else would have guaranteed the existence of the cake. Cook also saw to the firing. This gave Elma such a delightful feeling of gratitude that she opened out her heart on the subject of meringues. Cook said that of course it was easy for them "as had never tried" just to rush in and make meringues the first thing. The likes of herself found them "kittlish" things. You may make meringues all your life, and then they'll go wrong for no reason at all. It was "knack" that was wanted principally.
"Do you think I've got knack, Cook?" asked Elma humbly.
Cook gave her a clear night in the kitchen for the meringues, as a reward for her humility. It was marvellous that nearly all of them came fairly decently. Cook found the shapes "a bit queer," but "them as knew" who was providing the party wouldn't think they were "either here or there."
"I'll make it up with the cream," quoth Elma happily. A great load was off her mind.
She now devoted herself to Betty's trifle. As a great triumph they decided to provide a better trifle than even Cook knew how to prepare. Miss Grace entered heartily into the plan. They were allowed to call one morning when she was ensconced in the parlour. Saunders brought in solemnly, first, several sheets of white paper. These were laid very seriously on the bare finely-polished table. Then came a plate of sponge cake in neat slices, a thin custard in a glass jug, several little dishes, one of blanched almonds cut in long strips, another of halved cherries, one of tiny macaroon biscuits, and so on. Miss Grace set herself in a high chair, and proceedings began. Elma wondered to the end of her days what kind of a cook Miss Grace would have made if she had been paid for her work. Everything was prepared for Miss Grace, but she took an hour and a quarter to finish the trifle. She added custard in silver spoonfuls as though each one had a definite effect of its own, and she several times measured the half glassful of cordial which was apportioned to each layer of sponge cake. The ceremony seemed interminable. Elma saw how true it was what her father often said, that one ought always to have a big enough object in life to keep one from paying too much importance to trifles. She immediately afterwards apologized to herself for the pun, which, she explained in that half world of dreaming to which she so often resorted, she hadn't at all intended.
Elma and Betty, however, to the end of their days, never forgot how to make trifle.
Betty's trifle was a magnificent success.
Jean engaged a whole fruiterer's shop, as it seemed, for her salad, and found she made enough for forty people out of a fourth of what she had ordered. This put Mrs. Leighton back into her old prophetic position. Had she not told Jean a quarter of that fruit would be enough?
Mabel arranged everything in good order for her chicken concoction, and at last had only the mayonnaise to make. That occurred on the afternoon of the party. Cuthbert and Harry and Mr. Maclean were all about--supposed to be helping. May Turberville, Betty's great friend, and her brother Lance, a boy of fourteen, brought round various loans in the way of cups and cream and sugar "things." The table in the dining-room was laid for supper with a most dainty centre-piece decked with roses and candelabra. Most of their labours being over, the company retreated to the smoke-room, where "high jinks" were soon in process. Lance capered about, balancing chairs on his nose, and doing the wild things which only take place in a smoke-room.
In the midst of it appeared Mabel, wide-eyed and distressed, at the door. The white apron of a few days ago was smeared with little elongated drops of oily stuff. She held a fork wildly dripping in her hand.
"Oh--oh, isn't it awful," she cried, "the mayonnaise won't may."
It was the last anxiety, and, in the matter of the pints of the Leighton girls, quite the last straw. Just when they had begun to be confident of their party, the real backbone of the thing had given out.
Dr. Harry removed a cigarette from his lips.
"Hey--what's that?" he asked. "Mayonnaise--ripping! I knew an American Johnnie who made it. Bring it here, and we'll put it right."
Mabel spread her hands mutely. "In this atmosphere?" she asked.
Oh! They had soon the windows open. Harry insisted he could make mayonnaise. "You don't meet American men for nothing, let me tell you," he said. It was fun to see him supplied with plate, fork and bottles. He looked at Mabel's attempt at dressing.
"Good gracious!" he said, "where's the egg?"
Mabel turned rather faint. "I put in the white," said she.
Dr. Harry roared. Then he explained carefully and kindly.
"Mayonnaise is an interesting affair--apart from the joys of eating it. A chemical action takes place between the yoke of an egg and the oil and vinegar. You could hardly expect the white to play up."
"It was Cook," exclaimed Mabel. "She said something about yokes for a custard and whites for--for----"
"Meringues, you donkey," said Jean.
Dr. Harry made the mayonnaise.
Lance Turberville cut the most shameful capers throughout. He decorated Harry with paper aprons and the cap of a chef, and stuck his eyeglass in the wrong eye while Harry worked patiently with a fork in semicircles. He was sent off with Betty and May, only to reappear later dressed out as a maid-servant. Nobody except Dr. Harry could take the mayonnaise seriously while Lance was about. At that moment the outdoor bell rang. With the inspiration born of mischief, and before any one could stop him, Lance rushed off and opened it.
Three ladies stood on the doorstep.
He showed them solemnly into the drawing-room, tripping over his skirt merely a trifle, and nearly giving Bertha, who had primly come to attend to the door, hysterics. He advanced to the smoke-room, where the mayonnaise was nearly completed.
"Mrs. and Miss Dudgeon and Miss Steven are in the drawing-room," said Lance.
CHAPTER VII
Visitors Again
By itself an occurrence like this would have been unnerving enough. Visitors on the afternoon of a party, and such visitors! But that the Leightons should all be more or less in a pickle in regard to the mayonnaise and Lance's foolery seemed to take things altogether over the barrier of ordinary life, and land everybody in a perfect fizzle. The Dudgeons must have called to see Cuthbert, who had never been down yet on these occasions when Mrs. Leighton and Mabel and Jean with perfect propriety had received them. Mabel had had her innings as the eldest of the house, but had retained an enormous reserve when speaking to Miss Dudgeon. Not so Jean, who believed in getting to know people at once. Elma and Betty had never ventured near them since that dreadful day when they all did the wrong thing at the wrong moment.
"Anyhow, the drawing-room is a perfect dream with flowers. They can look at that for a bit," said Jean, as they began to remove the regiment of bottles. Dr. Harry's mayonnaise was creamy and perfect, and Mabel was in high fettle correspondingly.
"Do you know," she said, "I don't care tuppence for the Dudgeons just now. Let's go in and give them a decent reception for once." It reflected the feeling of all, that nothing could disturb their gaiety on this day.
Elma was reminded again how right her father was in declaring that once one had an absorbing object in front of one, trifles dwindled down to their proper level. Why should any of them be afraid of the Story Books? Certainly not at all, on a day when they were about to have a ripping party, and the mayonnaise at last had "mayed." Cuthbert gave a big jolly laugh at Mabel's speech.
"Come along, all of you," he said. "What about those oily fingers of yours, Harry? What a jewel of a husband you'll be! You, Lance, get off these togs and behave yourself."
Lance promised abjectly to be an ornament to the household for the rest of the afternoon. Something in his look as he went off reminded Mabel of other promises of Lance.
"Be good," she called out to him.
"Yes, mother," exclaimed Lance, evidently at work already tearing off the skirt, and looking demure and mournful. He seemed very ridiculous still, and they went off merrily to the drawing-room.
"Cuthbert," whispered Elma, "I'm so frightened. Take me in."
"I'm frightened too," whispered Cuthbert.
This made her laugh, so that as she held on to his arm she approached Adelaide Maud in admirable spirits. The party invaded the drawing-room as a flood would invade it--or so it seemed to the Dudgeons, who were talking quietly to Mrs. Leighton. The whole room sprouted Leightons. Mrs. Dudgeon resorted entirely to her lorgnette, especially when she shook hands with Cuthbert. He stood that ordeal bravely, also the ordeal of the speech that followed.
"You see the two very shy members of the family," he said, bowing gravely and disregarding some sarcastic laughter from the background. "May I introduce my young sister Elma."
Here was honour for Elma. She shook hands with crimson cheeks. Then came Adelaide Maud. She gave her hand to Cuthbert without a word, but when Elma's turn came she said with rather sweet gravity, "This is the little lady, isn't it, who plays to Miss Grace?"
Elma was thunderstruck; but Cuthbert, the magnificent, seemed very pleased.
"Oh--Miss Grace didn't tell you?" asked Elma.
"No, I heard you one day, and Miss Annie told me it was you."
Adelaide Maud sat down on a low chair, and drew Elma on to the arm.
"What was it you were playing?" she asked.
"One is called 'Anything you like,' and one is 'A little thing of my own,' and the others are just anything," said Elma.
Adelaide Maud laughed.
The room was filled with chattering voices, and Mrs. Dudgeon had claimed Cuthbert, so that it became a very easy thing for them to be confidential without any one's noticing.
"It's quite stup--stup----" Elma stopped.
"Stupid?" asked Adelaide Maud.
"No, stup-endous," said Elma thankfully, "for me to be talking all alone with you." Her fright had run away, as it always did whenever any one looked kindly at her. The sweet eyes of Adelaide Maud disarmed her, and she worshipped on the spot. "I've always been so afraid of you," she said simply. "It ought to be Hermione, but I know it will always be you."
"Who is Hermione?" asked Adelaide Maud.
Elma suddenly woke up.
"Oh, I daren't tell you," said she.
Adelaide Maud looked about her in a constrained way.
"I wish you would play to me, dear," she said.
Was this really to be believed!
"I could in the schoolroom," said Elma, "but not here."
"Take me to the schoolroom," said Adelaide Maud.
Elma placed her hand in that of the other delicately gloved one without a tremor.
"Don't let them see us go," she begged.
Three people did, however: Cuthbert with a bounding heart, Mabel with thankfulness that the house was really in exhibition order, and Jean with blank amazement. Elma had walked off in ten minutes intimately with the flower that Jean had, as it were, been tending carefully for weeks, and had not dared to pluck. There was something of the dark horse about Elma.
They were much taken up with Miss Steven however. She was very fair and petite, and had pretty ways of curving herself and throwing back her head, and of spreading her hands when she talked. She seemed to like to have the eyes of the room fixed on her. Quite different from the Dudgeons, who in about two ticks stared one out of looking at them at all. Mr. Leighton came in also, and what might be called her last thaw was undergone by Mrs. Dudgeon in the pleasure of meeting him. If she had her ideas on beaded cushions, she had certainly no objections to Mr. Leighton. In five minutes he was explaining to her that sea trout are to be discovered in fresh water lakes at certain seasons of the year.
Unfortunately, just then Mrs. Dudgeon happened to look out of the windows. There were three long ones, and each opened out on that sunny day to the lawn at the side of the house. If Mrs. Dudgeon had kept her eye on the Louis Seize clock or the famous Monticelli, all might have gone well, but she preferred to look out of the window. In spite of the general hilarity of the party around her, her action in looking out seemed to impress them all. Everybody except Mr. Leighton looked out also, and then came an ominous silence.
Mr. Maclean giggled.
This formed a link to a burst of conversation. Jean turned to Miss Steven and engaged her in a whirlwind of talk. Cuthbert vainly endeavoured to move the stony glance of Mrs. Dudgeon once more in the direction of his father. Dr. Harry wildly asked Mabel to play something.
Mabel never forgave him.
Mrs. Dudgeon immediately became preternaturally polite, said she had often heard of the musical proclivities of the Misses Leighton, and Mabel had really to play.
"Oh, Harry," she exclaimed, "I never played with a burden like this on my mind, never in all my life. The party to-night--and that mayonnaise (it will keep maying, won't it?)--and Elma goodness knows where with Adelaide Maud, and those kids in the garden--couldn't Cuthbert go and slay them?"
She dashed into a Chopin polonaise.
The kids in the garden were what had upset Mrs. Dudgeon. There were two--evidently playing "catch me if you can" with one of the maid-servants--the one who had shown them in. She rushed about in a manner which looked very mad. This exhibition on the drawing-room side of the house! Really--these middle class people!
Mrs. Dudgeon extended the lorgnette to looking at them once more.
A horizontal bar was erected in a corner of the lawn. Towards this the eccentric maid-servant seemed to be making determined passes, frantically prevented every now and again by the two young girls. The chords of the "railway polonaise" hammered out a violent accompaniment. Mabel could play magnificently when in a rage. Little Miss Steven was enchanted.
Nearer came the maid-servant to the horizontal bar. At last she reached it. May and Betty sat down plump on the lawn in silent despair. Lance pulled himself gently and gracefully up. Not content with getting there, he kissed his hand to the unresponsive drawing-room windows. To do him justice, there was little sign for him that any one saw him, and Mabel's piano playing seemed to envelop everything. He did some graceful things towards the end of the polonaise, but with the last chords became violently mischievous again. With a wild whirl he turned a partial somersault. Mrs. Dudgeon shrieked. "Oh, that woman," said she. Just then Lance stopped his whirlings and sent his feet straight into the air. His skirts fell gracefully over his face. Dr. Harry laughed a loud laugh, and at last Mr. Leighton asked what was the matter.
"It's Lance," said Jean. "He has been playing tricks all the afternoon."
Everything might have been forgiven except that Mrs. Dudgeon had been taken in. She had screamed, "That woman."
She began to look about for Adelaide Maud.
"Will you be so kind as to tell my daughter that we must be going," she said to Mr. Leighton.
Cuthbert volunteered to look for her.
Dr. Harry really did the neat thing. He went out for Lance and brought him in with Betty and May. He hauled Lance by the ear to Mrs. Dudgeon.
"Here you see a culprit of the deepest dye."
Lance looked very rosy and mischievous, and Miss Steven, who had been immersed in hysterical laughter since his exploit on the bar, was delighted with him.
"I am so sorry," said Lance gravely, encouraged by this appreciation, "but I promised mother that I should be an ornament to the company this afternoon."
"Oh, Lance," said May, "how can you!"
"By 'mother,' of course I mean Mabel," said Lance to Mrs. Dudgeon in an explanatory fashion. "She has grown so cocky since she put her hair up."
Mrs. Dudgeon determined to give up trying to unravel the middle classes.
Mr. Maclean broke in. "Everybody spoils Lance, Mrs. Dudgeon. It isn't quite his own fault; look at Miss Steven."
Miss Steven, always prompt to appreciate a person's wickedest mood, had made an immediate friend of Lance.
"They are a great trial to us, these young people," said Mr. Leighton gently.
The speech wafted her back to her gracious mood, and for a little while longer she forgot that she had sent for Adelaide Maud.
Meanwhile Cuthbert endeavoured to discover what had happened to that "delicious" person.
With swishing skirts, and gleam of golden hair under a white hat, Elma had seen herself escort Adelaide Maud from the drawing-room to the schoolroom. Adelaide Maud sat on a hassock in the room where "You don't mean to say you were all babies," and Elma played "Anything you like" to her.
Adelaide Maud's face became of the dreamy far-away consistency of Miss Grace's--without the cap, and Elma felt her cup of happiness run over.
"Does your sister play like that?" asked Adelaide Maud.
"Far better," said Elma simply.
They heard the bars of the railway polonaise, and the schoolroom, being just over the drawing-room, they had also the full benefit of Lance's exploit.
Adelaide Maud laughed and laughed.
"Oh, what will Mrs. Dudgeon say?" asked Elma.
She told Adelaide Maud about the party, a frightful "breach of etiquette," as Mabel informed her later. Adelaide Maud's face grew serious and rather sad.
"What a pity you live in another ph--phrase of society," sighed Elma, "or you would be coming too, wouldn't you?"
"Would you really ask me?" asked Adelaide Maud.
Ask her?
Did Adelaide Maud think that if the world were made of gold and one could help one's self to it, one wouldn't have a little piece now and again! She was just about to explain that they would do anything in the world to ask her, when Cuthbert came into the room. Adelaide Maud got so stiff at that moment, that immediately Elma understood that it would never do to ask her to the party.
Cuthbert explained that Mrs. Dudgeon had sent him to fetch Miss Dudgeon.
"Oh," said Adelaide Maud.
She did not make the slightest move towards leaving, however.
She looked straight at Cuthbert, and Elma could have sworn she saw her lip quiver.
"I believe I have to apologize to you," she said in a very cold voice. "I cut out a dance, didn't I--at the Calthorps'!"
"Did you?" asked Cuthbert.
Elma wondered that he could be so negligent in speaking to Adelaide Maud. She never could bear to see Cuthbert severe, and it had the effect of terrifying her a trifle and making her take the hand of Adelaide Maud in a defensive sort of manner.
Adelaide Maud held her hand quite tightly, as though Elma were really a friend of some standing.
"I didn't intend to, but I know it seemed like it," said Adelaide Maud in perfectly freezing tones.
Cuthbert looked at her very directly, and seemed to answer the freezing side more than the apologizing one.
"Oh--a small thing of that sort, what does it matter"? he said grandly.
Adelaide Maud turned quite pale.
"Thank you," said she. "It's quite sweet of you to take it like that," and she marched out of the schoolroom with her skirts swishing and her head high. No--it would never do to invite Adelaide Maud to the party.
Elma however had seen another side to this very dignified lady, and so ran after her and took her hand again.
"You aren't vexed with me, are you?" she whispered.
Adelaide Maud at the turn of the stairs, and just at the point where Cuthbert, coming savagely behind, could not see, bent and kissed Elma.
"What day do you go to Miss Grace's?" she asked.
"To-morrow at three," whispered Elma, with her plans quite suddenly arranged.
"Don't tell," said Adelaide Maud, "I shall be there."
Mrs. Dudgeon departed with appropriate graciousness. The irrepressible gaiety of the company round her had merely served to make her more unapproachable. She greeted Adelaide Maud with a stare, and strove to make her immediate adieus. Mr. Maclean, always ready to notice a deficiency, remembered that Mr. Leighton had never met Adelaide Maud, and forthwith introduced her. Adelaide Maud took this introduction shyly, and Mr. Leighton was charmed with her. With an unfaltering estimate of character he appraised her then as being one in a hundred amongst girls. Adelaide Maud, on her part, showed him gentle little asides to her nature which one could not have believed existed. Mrs. Dudgeon grew really impatient at the constant interruptions which impeded her exit.
"Mr. Leighton has just been telling me," she said by way of getting out of the drawing-room, "that a little party is to be celebrated here to-night. I fear we detain you all." Nothing could have been more gracious--and yet! Mabel flushed. It seemed so like a children's affair--that they should be having a party, and that the really important people were actually clearing out in order to allow it to occur.
Miss Steven said farewell with real regret.
"I don't know when I have had such a jolly afternoon," she said. "I think I must get knocked over oftener. Though I don't want Mr. Leighton to break his ribs every time. Do you know," she said in a most heart-breaking manner, "I've been hardly able to breathe for thinking of it. You can't think how nice it is to see you all so jolly after all."
When they had got into the Dudgeons' carriage, and were rolling swiftly homewards, she yawned a trifle.
"What cures they are," she said airily.
Adelaide Maud, in her silent corner of the carriage, felt her third pang of that memorable afternoon.
CHAPTER VIII
The Party
Nobody knew how anybody got dressed for the party, and certainly nobody took any dinner to speak of. It was laid in the morning-room, and Mr. Leighton said throughout that roystering meal that never again, no matter how many ribs Cuthbert broke or how much sympathy he excited, would he allow them to have a party.
The occasion became memorable, not only because of Cuthbert or the mayonnaise, or the Dudgeons, but because on that night Robin Meredith appeared. Mabel and Jean lately had already in quite a practical manner begun to wonder whom Mabel would be obliged to marry. Jean was getting very tall, and showed signs of being so near the grown-up stage herself, that she was anxious to see Mabel disposed of, so as to leave the way clear.
"The eldest of four ought to look sharp," she declared; "we can't allow any trifling."
This seemed rather overwhelming treatment of Mabel, who was only seventeen. But viewed from that age, even a girl of twenty-one is sometimes voted an old maid, and Mabel was quite determined not to become an old maid.
"There seems to be only George Maclean," she had sighed in a dismal way. She was quite different from Elma, who continually dreamed of a duke. George Maclean would do very well for Mabel, only, as Jean complained, "George Maclean is a gentleman and all that kind of thing, but he has no prospects." So they rather disposed of George Maclean, for immediate purposes at least. Then came Mr. Meredith. After that, in the language of the Leightons, it was all up with Mabel. She would simply have to get engaged and married to Mr. Meredith.
Mr. Meredith was of middle height, with rather a square, fair face, and a short cut-away dark moustache. He spoke in a bright concise sort of way, and darted very quick glances at people when addressing them. He came in with the Gardiners, and after shaking hands with Mrs. Leighton he darted several quick glances round the room, and then asked abruptly of Lucy Gardiner "Who was the tall girl in white?"
Here was the point where the fortunes of the Leighton girls became at last crystallized, concrete. It is all very well to dream, but it is much pleasanter to be sure that something is really about to happen.
None of this undercurrent was noticeable, however, in the general behaviour of that imaginative four. They began the evening in a dignified way with music. Every one either sang or played. Jean in her usual hearty fashion dashed through a "party piece." Even Elma was obliged to play the Boccherini Minuet, which she did with the usual nervous blunders.
As Dr. Harry placed the music ready for her, she whispered to him, "Whenever I lift my heels off the floor, my knees knock against each other."
"Keep your heels down," said Dr. Harry with the immobile air of a commanding officer.
Elma found the piano pedals, and in the fine desire to follow out Dr. Harry's instructions played Boccherini with both pedals down throughout.
"How you do improve, Elma!" said May Turberville politely.
And Elma looked at her with a mute despair in her eyes of which hours of laughter could not rid them. If only they knew, those people in that room, if only they knew what she wanted to play, the melodies that came singing in her heart when she was happy, the minor things when she was sad! All she could do when people were collected to stare at her was to play the Boccherini Minuet exceedingly badly. The weight of "evenings" had begun already to rest on Elma. Her undoubted gifts at learning and understanding music brought her into sharp prominence with her teachers and family, but never enabled Elma to exhibit herself with advantage on any real occasion.
It was all the more inexplicable that Mabel could at once dash into anything with abandon and perfect correctness. Technique and understanding seemed born in her. In the same way could she, light-heartedly and gracefully, take the new homage of Mr. Meredith, who made no secret of his interest in her from the first moment of entering the drawing-room. Mabel received him as she received a Sonata by Beethoven. With fleet fingers she could read the one as though she had practised it all her life; with dainty manners she seemed to comprehend Mr. Meredith from the start, as though she had been accustomed to refusing and accepting desirable husbands from time immemorial. It put her on a new footing with the rest of the girls. They felt in quite a decided way, within a few days even, that the old, rather childish fashion of talking about husbands was to be dropped, and that no jokes were to be perpetrated in regard to Mr. Meredith. It began to be no fun at all having an eligible sister in the house.
On this night, however, they were still children. About forty young people, school friends of themselves and Cuthbert, sustained that gaiety with which they had begun the afternoon. Even the musical part, where Mr. Leighton presided and encouraged young girls with no musical talents whatever to play and sing, passed with a certain amount of lightness. Before an interlude of charades, a strange girl was shown in. She giggled behind an enormous fan, and made a great show of canary-coloured curls in the process. She seemed to have on rather skimpy skirts, and she showed in a lumbering way rather large shiny patent shoes with flat boys' bows on them.
There was a moment of indecision before Betty broke out with the remark, "You might have had the sense to hide your feet, Lance."
The canary-coloured curls enabled Lance to look becomingly foolish. In any case, Mr. Leighton could not prevent the intellectual part of the evening from falling to bits. They had no more real music. Instead, they fell on Lance and borrowed his curls, and made some good charades till supper time.
"I can't help feeling very rocky about that supper," whispered Jean to Mabel. "Yet we've everything--sandwiches, cake, fruit and lemonade, tea and coffee. What can go wrong now?"
"Oh! the thing's all right," said Mabel, who was in a severely exalted mood by this time.
They trooped into the dining-room, where girls were provided in a crushy way with seats round the room, and boys ran about and handed them things. Mrs. Leighton gave the head of the table to Mabel, who sat in an elderly way and poured coffee. The salad was magnificent. Aunt Katharine had come in "to look on." Mrs. Leighton told her how Mabel had arranged forty-two plates that morning, with water-lily tomatoes cut ready and chopped chicken in the centres, and had nearly driven Cook silly with the shelves she used for storing these things in cool places.
"Wherever you looked--miles and miles of little plates with red water lilies," said Mrs. Leighton. "It was most distracting for Cook. I wonder the woman stays."
"What a mess," said Aunt Katharine. "You spoil these girls, you know, Lucy."
"Oh--it's Mr. Leighton," said she sadly.
"I don't think mayonnaise is a very suitable thing for young people's parties," said Aunt Katharine dingily.
By this time the white cake with "Cuthbert" in pink was handed solemnly round. Every person had a large piece, it looked so good.
Every one said, "Walnut, how lovely," when they took the first bite.
Every one stopped at the second bite.
"Cuthbert," called out Mrs. Leighton after she had investigated her own piece, "I notice that your father has none of the cake. Please take him a slice and see that he eats it."
Mr. Leighton waved it away.
"I do not eat walnuts," said he.
Mrs. Leighton went to him.
"John, this is not fair, this is your idea of a party," she said. "You ought to eat Cuthbert's cake."
"He can't," cried Jean; "nobody can. It's only Mabel who likes iced marbles."
"You will all have to eat gingerbread," said the voice of Betty hopefully.
Jean started up in great indignation with a large battered-looking "orange iced cake" ready to cut.
"Betty always gets herself advertized first," she complained. "Please try my orange icing."
They did--they tried anything in order to escape Mabel's walnuts. It occurred to the girls that Mabel would be quite broken up at the wretched failure of her wonderful cake--the Cuthbert cake too. It was such a drop from their high pedestal of perfection. Even mummy, who had been so much on her own high horse at all their successes, now became quite feelingly sorry about the cake. She gave directions for having the loose pieces collected and surreptitiously put out of sight, but the large dish had to remain in front of Mabel. Mabel was still charmingly occupied over her coffee cups. She poured in a pretty direct way and yet managed to talk interestedly to Mr. Meredith. He was invaluable as a helper.
"And now, at last," said she in a most winning manner, "you must have a slice of my cake. I baked it myself, and it's full of walnuts. Don't you love walnuts?"
"I do," said Mr. Meredith.
May Turberville nudged Betty, and Lance stared open-mouthed at the courage of Mabel. He would do a good deal for the Leighton girls, but he barred that particular cake. An electric feeling of comprehension ran round the company. They seemed to know that Mabel was about to taste her own cake and give a large slice to Mr. Meredith. They made little airy remarks to one another in order to keep the conversation going, so that Mabel might not detect by some sudden pause that every one was watching her. One heard Julia Gardiner say in an intense manner to Harry Somerton that the begonias at Mrs. Somerton's were a "perfect dream." And Harry answered that for his part he liked football better. Even Mr. Leighton noticed the trend of things, and stopped discussing higher morality with Aunt Katharine.
Mabel seemed to take an interminable time. She gave Mr. Meredith a large piece, and insisted besides on serving him with an unwieldy lump of pink icing containing a large scrawly "e" from the last syllable of Cuthbert's name.
"E--aw," brayed Lance gently, and Betty exploded into a long series of helpless giggles.
"What a baby you are, Lance," said Mabel, amiably laughing. She bit daintily at the walnut cake.
Mr. Meredith bit largely.
There was an enormous pause while they waited to see what he would do.
Cuthbert and Ronald Martin were near, aimlessly handing trifle and fruit salad. Mr. Meredith helped with one hand to pass a cup.
"You know, Leighton," he said, "I have a great friend, he was one of your year--Vincent Hope--do you remember him?"
Cuthbert stared. One mouthful was gone and Mr. Meredith was cheerfully gulping another.
"What a digestion the man has," he thought, and next was plunged politely in reminiscent conversation regarding his College days.
Mabel sat crunching quite happily at the despised walnut cake.
Lance approached her timidly.
"For Heaven's sake," he said, "give me a large cup of coffee for the ostrich. The man will die if he isn't helped."
"Who on earth do you mean, Lance?" asked Mabel innocently.
"Meredith. Don't you see he has eaten the cake."
Mabel looked conscience-stricken. Her own slice had not dwindled much.
"It is rather chucky-stoney, isn't it?" she asked anxiously.
"It's terrific," said Lance sagely.
Mabel looked quite crushed for a moment, so crushed that even Lance's mischievous heart relented.
"Never mind, Mabel," he comforted her. "If Meredith can do that much for you without a shudder, he will do anything. It's a splendid test."
A golden maxim of Mrs. Leighton's flashed into Mabel's mind, "You never know a man till he has been tried." It made her smile to think that already they might be supposed to be getting to know Mr. Meredith because of her villainous cake.
"The piece we tested wasn't so bad," she explained to Lance, quite forgetting that she had skimmed that quantity in order to get plenty of chopped walnuts into the "real" cake.
A few people in the room seemed fearfully amused, and poor Mabel in an undefined manner began to feel decidedly out of it. Lance went about like a conspirator, commenting on the appearance of "the ostrich." He approached Cuthbert, asking him in an anxious manner how long the signs of rapid poisoning might be expected to take to declare themselves after a quadruple dose of walnut cake. Mr. Meredith unruffled, still handed about cups for Mabel.
Jean was in a corner with her dearest friend Maud Hartley.
"Isn't it wonderful what love can do?" she remarked quite seriously. It was a curious thing that Elma, who dreamed silly dreams about far-away things, and was despised for this accordingly by the robust Jean, did not become romantic over Mr. Meredith at all. She merely thought that he must be fearfully fond of walnuts.
The supper was hardly a pleasure to her--or to Betty. Every dish was an anxiety. They could almost count the plates for the different courses in their desire to know whether each had been successfully disposed of. There was no doubt about the trifle.
"What a pity Mabel didn't make it," sighed Jean. After all, Mabel had only inspired the chicken salad, and even there Dr. Harry had made the mayonnaise.
"It isn't much of a start for her with Mr. Meredith," she sighed dismally, "if only we hadn't told anybody which was which."
Mr. Meredith took a large amount of trifle, praising it considerably.
This alarmed Lance more than ever.
"One good thing does not destroy a bad thing," he exclaimed. "The first axiom to be learned in chemistry is that one smell does not kill another. It is a popular delusion that it does. Meredith seems to have been brought up on popular lines."
He posed in front of Cuthbert with his hands in his pockets.
"We are running a great risk," said he. "To-morrow morning Meredith may be saying things about your sisters which may prevent us men from being friends with him--for ever."
Above the general flood of conversation, Aunt Katharine's treble voice might now be heard.
"Mabel," she said in a kind manner, "I must compliment you. When your mother told me about this ridiculous party, I told her she was spoiling you as she always does. In my young days we weren't allowed to be extravagant and experiment in cooking whenever a party occurred. We began with the 'common round, the daily task.'" Aunt Katharine sighed heavily. "But I never knew you could make a trifle like this."
Mabel had been sitting like the others, trying to subdue the merriment which Aunt Katharine's long speeches usually aroused. The wind-up to this tirade alarmed her however. She would have to tell them all, with Mr. Meredith standing there, that the trifle was not her trifle. She would have to say that it was Betty's.
Before she could open her mouth however, the whole loyal regiment of Leightons had forestalled her.
"Isn't it a jolly trifle!" they exclaimed. Mabel could even hear Betty's little pipe joining in.
"Oh, but I must tell you," she began.
Cuthbert appeared at the doorway.
"Drawing-room cleared for dancing," said he. "Come along."
That finished it, and the girls were delighted with themselves. But one little melancholy thing, for all her partisanship, disturbed Jean considerably. Mr. Meredith, on giving his arm to Mabel for the first dance, was heard distinctly to remark, "You make all these delicious things as well as play piano! How clever of you."
And Mabel looking perfectly possessed floated round to the first waltz as though she had not made a complete muddle of the walnut cake.
Jean did not regret their generosity, but she was saddened by it.
"It all comes of being the eldest," she confided to Maud, "We may stand on our heads now if we like, but if anything distinguished happens in the family, Mabel will get the credit of it."