FullReads

Presently a few of the nuns arrived, escorting a score of little girls, and briskly ready for an evening of serious work. Then some of the older girls, carrying their musical instruments, came in laughing. Laughter and talk began to make the big house hum, the nuns ruling the confusion, gathering girls into groups, suppressing the hilarity that would break out over and over again, and anxious to clear a corner and begin the actual work. A tall girl, leaning on the piano, scribbled a crude programme, murmuring to the alert-faced nun beside her as she wrote:

“Yes, Sister, and then the mandolins and guitars; yes, Sister, and then Mary Cudahy’s recitation; yes, Sister. Is that too near Loretta’s song? All right, Sister, the French play can go in between, and then Loretta. Yes, Sister.”

“Of course Marg’ret’ll come, Tess,–or has she come?” said Mrs. Costello, who was hastily clearing a table in the family sitting-room upstairs, because it was needed for the stage setting. Teresa, who had just joined her mother, was breathless.

“Mother! Something awful has happened!”

Mrs. Costello carefully transferred to the book-case the lamp she had just lifted, dusted her hands together, and turned eyes full of sympathetic interest upon her oldest daughter,–Teresa’s tragedies were very apt to be of the spirit, and had not the sensational urgency that alarms from the boys or Alanna commanded.

“What is it then, darlin’?” said she.

“Oh, it’s Marg’ret, mother!” Teresa clasped her hands in an ecstasy of apprehension. “Oh, mother, can’t you MAKE her take that white dress?”

Mrs. Costello sat down heavily, her kind eyes full of regret.

“What more can I do, Tess?” Then, with a grave headshake, “She’s told Sister Rose she has to drop out?”

“Oh, no, mother!” Teresa said distressfully. “It’s worse than that! She’s here, and she’s rehearsing, and what DO you think she’s wearing for an exhibition dress?”

“Well, how would I know, Tess, with you doing nothing but bemoaning and bewildering me?” asked her mother, with a sort of resigned despair. “Don’t go round and round it, dovey; what is it at all?”

“It’s a white dress,” said Teresa, desperately, “and of course it’s pretty, and at first I couldn’t think where I’d seen it before, and I don’t believe any of the other girls did. But they will! And I don’t know what Sister will say! She’s wearing Joe Hammond’s surplice, yes, but she IS, mother!–it’s as long as a dress, you know, and with a blue sash, and all! It’s one of the lace ones, that Mrs. Deane gave all the altar-boys a year ago, don’t you remember? Don’t you remember she made almost all of them too small?”

Mrs. Costello sat in stunned silence.

“I never heard the like!” said she, presently. Teresa’s fears awakened anew.

“Oh, will Sister let her wear it, do you think, mother?”

“Well, I don’t know, Tess.” Mrs. Costello was plainly at a loss. “Whatever could have made her think of it,–the poor child! I’m afraid it’ll make talk,” she added after a moment’s troubled silence, “and I don’t know what to do! I wish,” finished she, half to herself, “that I could get hold of her father for about one minute. I’d–“

“What would you do?” demanded Teresa, eagerly, in utter faith.

“Well, I couldn’t do anything!” said her mother, with her wholesome laugh. “Come, Tess,” she added briskly, “we’ll go down. Don’t worry, dear; we’ll find some way out of it for Marg’ret.”

She entered the parlors with her usual genial smile a few minutes later, and the flow of conversation that never failed her.

“Mary, you’d ought always to wear that Greek-lookin’ dress,” said Mrs. Costello, en passant. “Sister, if you don’t want me in any of the dances, I’ll take meself out of your way! No, indeed, the Mayor won’t be annoyed by anything, girls, so go ahead with your duets, for he’s taken the boys off to the Orpheum an hour ago, the way they couldn’t be at their tricks upsettin’ everything!” And presently she laid her hand on Marg’ret Hammond’s shoulder. “Are they workin’ you too hard, Marg’ret?”