"Why?"

Launcelot's eyes went to the sobbing figure in the little grandmother's arms.

"We can't make her unhappy," he said in a low voice.

"Anne?"

"Yes."

"Everything is spoiled now," said Judy, chokingly, "everything. And I took such an interest. I think it's mean--mean--mean--"

Her voice grew very shrill, and her face was red. Mrs. Batch.e.l.ler started to speak, but the Judge raised his hand to stop the untimely lecture.

"Wait!" he said.

Something in his kind old face reminded Judy suddenly of the story he had told her just a week before--of her grandmother and how she had conquered her temper.

With a strong effort she kept back the words of furious disappointment that she had intended to hurl at these weak-spirited people. Then she whisked out of the room and down the hall, and presently Launcelot, who had followed her, came back laughing but mystified.

"She is walking around the oval in the garden," he said, "as fast as she can go, and she won't stop."

The Judge slapped his hand on his knee. "By George," he said, with a sigh of relief, "she's done it!" But when Anne asked him to explain, he shook his head. "That's a secret between Judy and me," he said, "and I can't tell it," and over her head he smiled at Mrs. Batch.e.l.ler, who knew the story, and had often laughed with Judy's grandmother over it.

Judy came in, finally, rosy and breathless.

"Oh, invite your Miss Mary if you want to," she panted, as she kissed the tear-streaked face. "But don't expect me to act too saint-like. I am not made of the same stuff that you are, Anne."

"You are a brick," Launcelot p.r.o.nounced later, when they were alone in the dining-room superintending the putting up of the stage; "it was harder for you to give up than for Anne."

"No, I'm not a brick." said Judy, a little wearily, "I am just hateful.

But I do try," and his praise meant much to her, and helped her afterwards.

Miss Mary sat alone and discouraged when the note of invitation was handed to her. She had sent letters to the school board and the other teachers, pleading "unavoidable postponement," and now she was correcting papers with an aching head.

"Dear Miss Mary,"--said Anne's little note,--"Please come to our party to-day. It is going to be very nice, and we are sorry we set the same day as the school entertainment, and we won't be happy if you are not here. Please forgive us, and come. Your affectionate scholar, Anne."

And below the Judge had added, "I am anxious to supplement Anne's invitation and apology and to say with her, 'Please forgive us and come.'"

"I won't go," said Miss Mary at first, bitterly.

But when she had read the little letter again, she changed her mind.

"She is a dear child," she said.

And she washed her face and combed her hair, and put on her best white dress and her new summer hat with the roses in it, and went out looking young and pretty and with her headache forgotten.

And when she arrived at the Judge's she was escorted to a seat of honor in the front row, with the Judge on one side, and the little grandmother on the other, and with the astonished children smiling welcomes to her as she went up the aisle.

CHAPTER XI

THE PRINCESS AND THE LILY MAID

As the children arrived they were shown at once into the great dining-room, where at one end a stage had been erected and a curtain hung, from behind which came the sounds of hammering and subdued directions, given in Launcelot's voice.

"Amelia Morrison and Nannie May are in it," explained Tommy who had yearned for an important part, but Judy had declared against him.

"You shouldn't have been asked at all," she said, witheringly, "if it hadn't been that Anne begged that you might. You acted dreadfully the other day. Anne wouldn't have been punished if you had spoken right out, Tommy, and had said that it was your fault."

"Aw--yes, she would, too," stammered Tommy.

"I never could stand a coward," was Judy's fling, and at that Tommy subsided.

Behind the scenes Anne, in an entrancing trailing gown of pale blue with pearls wound in her long fair braids was trying to get Jimmie Jones to shut his eyes without opening his mouth.

"But I always sleep with my mouth open," persisted Jimmie, who, in spite of his yellow curls and his page's costume of green satire was at heart just plain boy.

"Well, you shouldn't," scolded Anne, as she tripped over her train.

"You will simply spoil the picture. Just see how nice Judy and Amelia and Nannie look."

On the couch lay Judy all in soft, shining, satiny white, her dark hair spreading over the pillow, and one hand under her cheek; and at each end, Nannie and Amelia, in rose color and in violet, blissfully happy, and, though their eyes were closed, wide awake to the charms of the situation.

"Now--ready," whispered Anne, as Dr. Grennell's fine voice rolled out the last lines of the "Prologue." "Now--" and the curtain went up on "The Sleeping Princess."

Jimmie's mouth flew open and Amelia smiled, but little cared the gaping audience for such trifles. Breathless they stared as one scene followed another. Launcelot was a Prince that set all the little girls' hearts a-flutter, as he knelt beside the couch, with a great bunch of dewy roses in his arms, which, in the next picture, lay all scattered over Judy, when she waked and gazed at him dreamily. Jimmie came out strongly at this point, with a prodigious yawn that almost broke him in two, and was so expressive of great weariness that little Bobbie Green, his bosom friend, was carried away by the realism of it, and asked in awe, "Did he really sleep a hundred years?" and was not quite brought back to earth by Tommy Tolliver's exclamation, "Why you saw him awake this morning, Bobbie, didn't you?"

The Prince and the Princess went away together at last; she with a long velvet cloak covering the whiteness of her gown, and a hat with white plumes, and he with a sword at his side, that made Tommy Tolliver turn green with envy.

Jimmie Jones came down and sat by Bobbie Green during the intermission, in which lemonade was pa.s.sed and the pictures discussed.

Bobbie gazed upon him as one who has come from a strange country.

"Say, say," he whispered eagerly, "how could you sleep when we was makin' all that noise, Jimmie--clappin'?"

Jimmie took a long blissful gulp of lemonade, and then fished out the strawberry from the bottom of the gla.s.s. "Ho," he said, "that wasn't nothin'. It wasn't really me that was asleep, it was just my eyes,"

and Bobbie, though still hazy, accepted the explanation and fished for his strawberry in imitation of his distinguished friend and actor, Jimmie Jones!

Most of the children had read parts of "Elaine" at school, and they "Oh-ed" and "Ah-ed" as the fair-haired heroine appeared.

Anne was very sweet, very appealing, as she went through the sad little scenes, and when at last she sat at the window. Dr. Grennell did not read Elaine's song, but Anne sang it, to Judy's accompaniment, played softly behind the scenes.

"Sweet is true love, tho' given in vain, in vain; And sweet is death who puts an end to pain: I know not which is sweeter, no, not I."

And all the little girls wept into their handkerchiefs, while the boys sniffed audibly.

"Bless their hearts," said Mrs. Batch.e.l.ler to Miss Mary, "it's too bad to have them cry."

But the Judge, who was a keen observer of human nature, shook his head.