CHAPTER VII
THE SURPRISE
Sadie Appleby and Nan Harrison waited below stairs, chatting with Mrs. Morley while in her room above Jo crushed a felt hat over her dark hair and regarded her reflection with an air of discouragement.
"You look like a wreck," she told her mirrored self. "If you could get a little color in your face you might not look quite so much like a ghost."
As Jo reached the head of the stairs she paused for a moment to listen to the merry chatter of Nan and Sadie. Despite herself she felt hurt that they should feel so gay when they could not help knowing how downhearted she must be. Yesterday they had seemed to care whether she went to Laurel Hall with them or not. To-day they appeared quite reconciled to her staying home. Was it possible that Nan and Sadie, the two chums from whom she had rarely ever been separated during their years of work and fun together, should care so little for her as their manner seemed to imply? If they did not care, then she would show them that neither did she!
Jo shrugged her shoulders impatiently and forced a smile to her quivering lips. She must not—must not!—allow herself to become morbid!
So it was a rather strained though smiling Jo who met her friends at the foot of the stairs.
"All right, let's go," she said. "We won't be gone long, Mother. Is there anything," as an afterthought, "that you need at the store?"
Mrs. Morley mentioned one or two articles, and Jo promised to bring them home with her when she returned.
"How is your Aunt Emma?" Jo asked of Nan when they were once outside the house.
"Amazingly fine!" Nan rejoined. "We have had the doctor in to see her this morning, Jo, and he says that there is a wonderful improvement in her. She seems to have taken a new hold on life and a new interest in it."
"Oh, I'm glad!" cried Jo. "Wouldn't it be wonderful if she got well after all?"
"She simply dotes on you," Sadie told her. "Nan says she talks of no one else."
"And she wants to see you again this morning," Nan added.
Jo frowned.
"I'd love to see her, of course. But if she is going to thank me again——"
"Nothing like that," Nan assured her buoyantly. "She just wants to see you. Says it would brighten her up."
It was on the tip of Jo's tongue to say that it would be hard for her to brighten any one up on that particular morning, but pride forbade the words. If the girls had forgotten so soon the change in her affairs that was nothing less than tragedy to her, then she would not remind them of it!
She permitted her companions to lead her to the Harrison house, the scene of all the excitement the previous afternoon.
"The fire was a false alarm in more senses than one," said Nan, as she opened the gate. "The Jamesons' hired man cleared out the chimney for us, and except for the dirt and the smoke grime on the woodwork, the house is as good as ever. Even Aunt Emma's room isn't hurt," she added, "although we've put her in the big front room until the paint can be washed and her room made presentable again."
Jo felt numb and dazed, almost as her father must have felt when he reached home the night before. It was so hard to pretend to be cheerful and matter-of-fact when one's world was falling to pieces about one's feet! She wanted to run away and hide herself in a corner and be openly just as miserable as she felt.
But Sadie's arm was linked in hers. She would have to go on pretending to be cheerful for a little while yet.
Her two chums took her up to the sunny front room where Miss Emma was sitting, her face brighter than Jo ever remembered it.
Mrs. Harrison, seated beside the invalid, came forward as Jo entered the room and kissed the girl affectionately.
"We owe you a great debt of gratitude, my dear," she said. "And now," with a glance over her shoulder at Miss Emma, "this lady has a request to make of you."
"A request?" Jo echoed, wondering.
She looked toward the two girls as though for an explanation. Both Nan and Sadie were smiling, and now Nan pushed her forward impatiently.
"Can't you see the lady wants to speak to you?" Sadie cried. "Don't stand there staring like a ninny, Jo Morley!"
Miss Emma motioned with her thin hand to a place on the window seat beside her chair.
"After what happened yesterday, I wanted to learn all about you, my dear——"
"Indeed, she asked me about six million questions!" Nan interjected.
"Naturally I wanted to find out about the girl that saved my life." Miss Emma made a quick imperative gesture as Jo would have interrupted. "And I found out many things; among them," instinctively the invalid's voice lowered, "that this girl, or rather her family, was in serious trouble."
Jo nodded and turned her face away. Just then she could not trust herself to speak.
"And what I want that girl to do," Aunt Emma continued while the spectators of the little scene drew closer to the two chief actors in it, "is to let me help, to try to repay the great debt I owe her."
As Jo looked up, wondering and a little startled, Miss Emma's hand covered hers.
"If your father's business is so involved that he can't see his way clear just now to sending you to Laurel Hall boarding school with Nan and Sadie," Miss Emma hurried on, "then I want you to let me take his place just now. I want you to let me send you instead. You will let me do that, won't you, dear?"
Jo's heart leaped with sudden hope, even while she felt that she could not accept so generous an offer. She was about to protest when she caught a warning glance from Nan, who was stationed behind the invalid's chair.
"Don't cross her!" was what Nan telegraphed. "It might prove serious!"
Jo, flustered, hardly knowing what reply to make, found herself looking straight into Miss Emma's kindly, questioning eyes.
"The favor would be to me, my dear," Miss Harrison continued. "It is a long time since I have been able to do anything for any one. If I thought I had helped to make you happy, who have done so much for me, that thought would give me a new interest in life, I think. You want to go to Laurel Hall, don't you?"
The blood rushed to Jo's face, her eyes shone.
"Want to go!" she cried. Suddenly she saw her way clear before her. "Oh, Miss Emma, you don't know how much I want to go! How wonderfully good and kind you are to me! I will never forget it! Never!"
Clinging to the eager girl, Miss Emma seemed to draw strength from the contact with glowing youth. Sitting there, sharing in the general rejoicing, she looked younger than she had looked for years.
"It would have been cruel to have refused her, Jo."
It was some time later and the chums were on their way to Jo's home to make definite plans for their departure for Laurel Hall.
In reply to Nan's observation Jo nodded.
"She had her heart set on it, and what a good heart she has! Imagine her wanting to send me away to school just because I was able to help a little yesterday. And, after all, what did I do?"
"Plenty, Miss Emma thinks," chuckled Sadie, and added with a gesture toward the Morley house: "There's your mother on the porch. Are you going to break the glad news to her now?"
"I'll say I am!"
Jo ran up the path to the house, took the porch steps two at a time, seized Mrs. Morley by the hands, and whirled her about until that lady scarcely knew which was her head and which her heels—at least, so she said.
"Mother!" cried Jo, "I've got a surprise for you! Something wonderful has happened! You will never guess what!"
"You'd better tell me," suggested her mother practically. "I can see you're bursting with it."
"Well, then, listen! I'm going to Laurel Hall, after all!"