Peggy Raymond's Way

It was the first day of the spring vacation, and Amy Lassell had spent it sewing. To be frank, it had not measured up to her idea of a holiday. Self-indulgence was Amy's besetting weakness. Her dearest friend, Peggy Raymond, was never happy unless she was busy at something, but Amy loved the luxury of idleness.

Yet although indolence appealed so strongly to Amy's temperament, to do her justice she was generally able to turn a deaf ear to its call. The first summer after America's entry into the war she had enlisted in the Land Army along with Peggy and Priscilla, and then in the fall had taken up her work at the local Red Cross headquarters, serving in an unpaid position as conscientiously as if she had received a salary and was depending on it for her bread and butter.

After a strenuous year with the Red Cross, Amy had entered college with Ruth Wylie. Neither girl had expected to enter till after the close of the war, and Amy was continually harping upon the respect which the young and unsophisticated Freshmen were bound to feel for classmates of such advanced years. But Nelson Hallowell's discharge from the service had altered the aspect of affairs. Ruth had pledged herself to keep Nelson's position for him till he should return, and Amy had promised to wait for Ruth. The wound which had kept Nelson in the hospital less than a month had nevertheless incapacitated him from military service. Heavy-hearted, he had returned to his job at the book store, while Ruth and Amy had immediately made their plans for entering college just two years behind Peggy and Priscilla.

After her months of hard study, the first day of the spring vacation found Amy at the sewing machine, which in itself was sufficient proof that, whatever her natural bias in the direction of indolence, her will was more than a match for that tendency. As a matter of fact she was the only one of the Friendly Terrace quartette to spend the day in unremitting industry. Peggy and Ruth had gone off with Graham for the day. Priscilla was entertaining an out-of-town guest. But Amy, resolution manifest in every line of her plump little figure, was sewing for dear life.

Though the armistice had been signed months before, there still remained foes to fight, as the girls had promptly discovered. The reaction from economy and hard work had come in the shape of an orgy of extravagance and frivolity. The high war prices were continually going higher, as dealers realized that people would get what they wanted regardless of price. The four Friendly Terrace girls, after an afternoon of shopping which had ended in the purchase of a box of hair-pins and two spools of thread, had returned home to hold a council of war.

"The only way to bring prices down is to stop buying things," declared Peggy, with all the authority of a college Junior. "I don't know as I have anything to make over, but if I have, nothing new for me this spring."

Amy sighed. "I'd just been luxuriating in the thought of a lot of new dresses," she said mournfully. "Don't you know how after you've been dieting, all at once you're hungry for creamed chicken and pineapple fritters, and chocolate with whipped cream, and strawberry sundaes, all rolled into one. And that's just the way I feel about clothes. But I suppose it will end in my making over my blue taffeta."

"I've two or three summer dresses that will do very well if I make the skirts scanty," said Ruth. "They're too full for this season."

They talked on seriously, planning their little economies as if they expected unaided to bring down the high cost of living. They were not the sort of girls who follow the crowd unthinkingly, nor had any of them contracted the fatal habit of asking, "What can one do?" The program they outlined would have resulted in a general lowering of prices in a month's time if every one had agreed to it. And it did not occur to them that public indifference excused them from doing their little part toward combating a serious evil.

That was how it happened that Amy Lassell had spent the spring day sewing. The blue taffeta had been ripped and pressed in anticipation of the vacation leisure, and as soon as the breakfast dishes were out of the way Amy had commandeered the dining-room table as a cutting table. With the help of a paper pattern she had remodeled the taffeta according to the latest dictates of fashion. Caution suggested that it would be advisable to wait for assistance in the fitting, but having basted the breadths together and surveyed her reflection in the mirror, Amy had been so favorably impressed that she had gone to work energetically stitching up seams.

Like many people whose natural tendency is in the direction of indolence, Amy was capable of relentless industry, almost as though she were afraid that if once she halted she might not get her courage to the point of starting again. She swallowed a hasty luncheon and rushed back to her sewing. Her eyes grew tired, her back ached. She became nervous and hot and impatient, so that breaking a thread or dropping a thimble seemed almost a calamity. And yet she did not stop.

It was after five when she laid her work reluctantly aside. Amy's responsibilities for the day were not limited to the blue taffeta. As in many another household, the domestic service problem had become acute in the Lassell establishment during the last few years. Incapable servants demanding preposterous wages, had been replaced by others equally incompetent, and there had been interims when it had been difficult to secure so much as a laundress. Amy and her mother had learned a good many short cuts to achievement, and had accepted the frequent necessity of doing their own work with a philosophy of which they would have been incapable in pre-war times. On this first day of vacation Amy was without a servant, and without a mother, as well; for Mrs. Lassell had left home that morning not to return till nearly bed-time.

At five o'clock the realization that she must prepare her father's supper forced itself on Amy's attention. It was not a formidable responsibility, for at breakfast that morning Mr. Lassell had informed her that he was to take a customer out to lunch and would be satisfied with very little for the evening meal. Amy meant to take him at his word. There was cold meat, quite enough for two, she thought; and some potatoes to fry, and her father did not care much for dessert. Accordingly, Amy had waited till five o'clock before she laid down her sewing, and then she realized for the first time how very tired she was. A glimpse of herself in the mirror emphasized her certainty that it was high time to stop. Amy's fair hair was disheveled, her plump cheeks brilliantly pink. There were dark lines under her eyes, eloquent of weariness. Amy regarded herself with extreme disfavor.

"Looks as if I'd taken up rouge in my old age. And I positively must do my hair over. I can't ask even poor patient daddy to look at such a frowsy head all through supper. O, well, he won't mind, if I am a little late."

Encouraging herself with this reflection, Amy bathed her burning cheeks, combed her hair hastily, and slipped into a little gingham gown which, if somewhat faded and passée, had at least the merit of being fresh and clean. It buttoned in the back, and by virtue of much twisting and stretching Amy finally succeeded in securing the middle button which for a time had defied her efforts. And just as she did so, the door-bell rang.

"'COME RIGHT IN,' SAID AMY WITH A MISLEADING AIR OF CORDIALITY"

Amy went placidly downstairs. She had no apprehensions about the door-bell. She took it for granted that it was somebody to collect for the newspaper, or an old-clothes man, or else a friend so intimate that she could ask her into the kitchen while she made her supper preparations. As she reached the door she realized her mistake. Of the two young people waiting admission she had met the sister several times. The brother she knew merely by sight, for the family had moved into the neighborhood only recently.

For a moment Amy's mood was one of unqualified dismay. She wanted to turn and run. With lightning-like rapidity she compared her faded gingham with the stylish frock setting off the girlish, graceful figure of Hildegarde Carey. And Hildegarde's brother, Robert, if looking a trifle bored, was immaculately attired. Amy recollected that in her absorption with the blue taffeta she had neglected to dust the living room that morning.

Amy opened the door with a smile that poorly concealed her anguish of spirit. Her flickering hope that Hildegarde had made a mistake in the number was dissipated by the composure of Hildegarde's greeting. The two young people entered, as Amy realized, without waiting to be asked, and in the hall Hildegarde performed the ceremony of introduction.

"Come right in," said Amy with a misleading air of cordiality. She wondered if she had better apologize for the undusted living room, but decided against it. Perhaps they would overlook it, though Robert Carey impressed her as one who would notice the least little thing out of the way. Amy decided that the young fellow's handsome face was almost spoiled by its discontented expression.

Another shock came when she said to Hildegarde, "Let me take your coat." She expected Hildegarde to reply that the coat was light and that she did not mind it for the few minutes she had to stay; but on the contrary she not only removed her coat, but slipped off her gloves, unpinned her hat, and added it to the collection Amy carried into the hall with a growing sense of stupefaction. "Any one would think," she told herself, "that she was an old friend come to spend the day."

Perhaps Amy's perplexity partly explained the fact that the next half hour dragged. Amy was not her usual entertaining self. She thought of the dust showing gray against the shining mahogany of the piano. She thought of her faded gingham. She heard herself talking stupidly, unnaturally, and chiefly about the weather. Robert Carey looked more bored than ever.

At half past six her father came in. He glanced at the group in the living room as he entered, and Amy hastily summoned him. Her guests must realize that when the man of the house came home it was time to leave. Amy introduced her father, pulled out an arm chair invitingly, and Mr. Lassell seated himself. It was from him that his daughter had inherited her sense of humor, and on this occasion he made himself much more entertaining than Amy had done. The conversation became almost animated.

The clock in the hall struck seven, tolling out the notes sonorously. Every one seemed to be listening to it, and Amy flushed. It was almost as if the clock had said, "Time to go home! Time to go home!" And then to her horror her father turned toward her inquiringly. "Hadn't you better put on the supper, my dear?" he asked. "Your friends will be getting hungry."

For an agonized half minute Amy vainly tried to think of something she could say to soften the blow. She was magnanimous enough to acquit her father of all blame. Seeing them sitting there at that hour, especially as Hildegarde had taken off her hat, he had innocently assumed that they had been invited to dinner. And of course his blunder was equivalent to saying that they had stayed longer than was proper or desirable.

Then Amy's head whirled again. Her guests did not spring to their feet as she had expected them to do, protesting that they had not dreamed it was so late. Instead they sat quite still, only murmuring a polite disclaimer of being hungry. With the force of a blow the realization came over Amy that they had accepted her father's tacit invitation. They were going to stay to supper.

Amy rose, murmuring something unintelligible, and got out of the room quickly. O, if Peggy were only home, Peggy who had such a faculty for evolving something savory and appetizing from the least promising materials. Amy's cooking until recently had been confined to chafing-dish delicacies and candy. It was too late, she realized, to add to her scanty stores. She must feed four people with what had seemed barely enough for two, and must do it quickly.

Mechanically she lighted the oven of the gas stove. She remembered there was a can of tomato soup in the house, and the cold meat, sliced very thin, might possibly pass muster. She herself would refuse meat. Luckily there was a generous plateful of potatoes. Creamed and with a little cheese grated over them, they would be appetizing-and filling. She could make baking powder biscuit,-Amy excelled in baking powder biscuit-and there was honey to eat with them. For dessert she would fall back on preserved peaches and some left-over fruit cake. It was a queer, hit-or-miss meal, not a company repast in any sense of the word, but the best she could do under the circumstances.

It was while the biscuits were browning in the oven, and Amy was hastily setting the table for four, that her native common-sense re-asserted itself. "After all," her thoughts ran, "if people take pot luck, they can't expect to find things just as they would be if they were especially invited. They've seemed real friendly and if they like me well enough to stay to a pick-up supper, the first time they've ever set foot in my home, I ought to meet them half way. I can't give them much to eat, but I don't need to be quite as stupid as I've been for the last hour."

And so it came about that when the guests were summoned to the dining room, they encountered a very different hostess from the one who had entertained them previously, a hostess who twinkled and sparkled and kept them laughing. It seemed to Amy that, when she had removed the soup plates and brought in the sliced meat and creamed potatoes, she had seen an expression of astonishment flicker across Hildegarde's face, but she resolutely put the thought aside and continued to make herself agreeable. The baking-powder biscuits had risen nobly to the occasion. Amy thought them the best she had ever made. And she saw with relief that the bored expression had disappeared from Robert Carey's face, and that he really seemed to be enjoying himself.

Then suddenly into the midst of all this gaiety, Hildegarde dropped a bomb in the shape of a question. "What happened to detain Isabel?"

"Isabel?"

"Yes, Isabel Vincent, you know."

"I'm afraid," Amy hesitated, "that I don't know any one of that name."

Apparently the meal had come to a full stop. "Why," Hildegarde cried, "the Isabel Vincent who attended the Pelham school when I was there."

She was so insistent that Amy unconsciously became apologetic. "I'm sorry but I can't say I remember such a girl. Did she ever say she had met me?"

"Why," Hildegarde almost screamed, "didn't you ask us here to-night to meet her?"

"To meet Isabel Vincent! Why, I never heard of her."

"There's some mistake," exclaimed Robert. He had just helped himself to a fifth baking-powder biscuit, but he laid it down unbuttered. "You've made some mistake," he informed his sister.

Hildegarde ignored him and addressed herself to Amy. "Didn't you telephone me this morning?"

"I-why, to tell the truth, no I didn't."

"Then it was a disgusting practical joke. Some one called me up about eleven o'clock and said she was Amy Lassell, and that Isabel Vincent was to stop here twenty-four hours on her way to New York from her home in Chicago. And then she invited Bob and me to dinner to meet Isabel. There wasn't anything in her manner to give me an idea it was a hoax."

But Amy had found the clew. "O, did Isabel come from Chicago?" she cried. "Then I know. It was Avery Zall who telephoned you."

"But I don't know her."

"She went away to boarding school-yes, it was the Pelham school, I'm sure. And I know she has a friend from Chicago visiting her. Probably the Vincent girl spoke of knowing you, and Avery called you up. O, dear!" groaned Amy with a sudden change of countenance.

"What's the matter?" demanded Bob Carey, still ignoring his biscuit.

"I've cheated you out of a regular feast. The Zalls have a wonderful cook. You'd have had broiled chicken and fresh mushrooms and I don't know what beside, and I've given you cold meat and-"

"You've given us the best biscuits I ever ate," said Bob, and buttered his fifth, but his sister had turned pale.

"I don't believe any one ever did such a dreadful thing before. Here we descended on you without warning and simply forced you to invite us to stay-"

"Happy escape, I think," said Bob. "If there's anything I hate, it's these social stunts Hildegarde's crazy about."

"The only dreadful part," said Amy, reassuring the distressed Hildegarde, "is that you've exchanged a perfectly gorgeous dinner for a pick-up supper."

"But what must Miss-Miss Zall think of me?"

"She must know there's some mistake. Probably they're not waiting dinner any longer, for it's after eight o'clock."

"O," groaned Hildegarde, "I never was so mortified. What am I going to do?"

"It seems to me you'd better finish your supper, such as it is," suggested Amy. "And then you can call up Avery Zall and explain your mistake. She'll see that the names sound alike over the phone. And after that there'll be plenty of time to see your friends."

"Seems to me," suggested Bob, "that as long as we've started the evening here, we might as well put it through."

His eyes met Amy's with a twinkle that was like a spark to tinder. Amy struggled for a moment, then gave way to peals of laughter.

"O," she gasped, when at length she could find her voice, "What must you have thought of me, inviting you to dinner and then coming down in this old, faded gingham."

"And what must you have thought of me," Hildegarde cried, "coming at such an hour and calmly taking off my hat."

"The dust was thick over everything," giggled Amy. "I've been sewing every minute all day long, and I warned father to expect a light meal."

"I should have known I had made a mistake," Hildegarde lamented, "when you never said a word about Isabel. I don't know how I could have been so ridiculously stupid."

But for all her dismay, she laughed. Indeed if laughter aids digestion, there was little danger that Amy's biscuits would disagree with any one, even Robert, who had dispatched such an extravagant number.

While Amy cleared the table and brought in the dessert, Hildegarde went to the phone and explained matters to a young woman whose preliminary stiffness melted as Hildegarde reviewed the situation. And then Hildegarde hurried back to inform her brother that they must go over as soon as he had finished. "She was as sweet as she could be, but she said they had waited dinner an hour."

"So it's up to you to 'gobble and git,'" quoted Amy, dishing out the preserves with a lavish hand.

"I'm not going to be hurried over that fruit cake," declared Bob. "It carries me back to the merry Christmas time."

"It ought to, for it's a Christmas cake, but it's been kept in a tin box with an apple and I hope it isn't dry. It was all I had in the cake line." Amy paused to laugh again. "I really must stop," she exclaimed, wiping her moist eyes. "They say that laughing at meal-time makes one fat, and I don't dare risk another pound."

"Can't have too much of a good thing," declared Bob Carey with a significant glance at the flushed face. Strictly speaking, Amy was perhaps the least pretty of the four Friendly Terrace girls; but good humor has a charm, and a face radiant with fun can hold its own against discontented beauty any day. There was such frank admiration in the look the young man bent upon her, that Amy's cheeks grew hot with an unwonted self-consciousness.

The brother and sister left with evident reluctance. "Now we've had dinner with you," said Hildegarde, "you must dine with us very soon."

"Oh, this doesn't deserve to be counted," Amy laughed. "I'll ask you again some day and show you what I can do if I really try."

"No, don't," pleaded Bob. "Have us again when you're going to have biscuit. It's so much jollier to be informal than to work the society racket." And then Hildegarde carried him off, protesting that, if they didn't hurry, Avery Zall would not believe a word of her excuse.

Amy found her father clearing the table. She put on her long apron and joined him, chattering excitedly as she worked.

"No full garbage can to-night, Daddy. Every dish is scraped clean. I suppose I ought to feel crushed over setting such a meal before people I hardly knew, but somehow I don't."

Her father smiling, responsive to her high spirits, shook his head.

"It isn't much to set good food before folks, Amy. Any waiter in a restaurant can do that. Give people the best of yourself and you don't need to worry about your bill of fare."

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