The Little Colonels House Party | Page 9

during breakfast, and she always rebelled when she had to go back to it in vacation. There was so little she could do that she really enjoyed. There was a stupid round of drives and walks, shopping and piano practice, and after that nothing but to mope and fret and worry poor Eliot. At school there was always the excitement of evading some rule or breaking it without being caught; and if there was no joke in prospect to giggle over, there was the memory of one just passed to make them laugh. And then there were always Mollie and Fay and Kit Keller--dear old "Kell"--ready to laugh or cry or lark with her any hour of the day or night, as it suited her mood.
Only seven days of vacation had passed, but to Eugenia it seemed an age since the four had walked back and forth across the school campus, with their arms around each other, waiting for the 'bus that was to drive them to the station.
The others were not so sorry to go, for they would be in the midst of their families. Mollie was to go to the mountains with all the members of her household, Fay to an island in the St. Lawrence, where her family had their summer home, and Kell was going on a long yachting trip, maybe to the Bermudas. It would be September before they all met again.
For Eugenia there was nothing in prospect but lonely days at the Waldorf, until her father could find time to take her down to the seashore for a few weeks. The tears were in her eyes when she laid down the three letters, after twice reading the one signed, "For ever your devoted old chum, Kell." It had been full of the good times she was having at home.
Eugenia looked around the elegantly furnished room with a discontented sigh. No girl in the school had as much spending money as herself, or as wealthy and as indulgent a father, and yet--just at that moment--she felt herself the poorest child in New York. There was one thing she lacked that even the poorest beggar had, she thought bitterly,--companionship. In a listless sort of way she picked up the remaining letter, postmarked Lloydsboro Valley, and began to read it.
Eliot, who was busy in the adjoining room, heard an excited exclamation, and then the call, "Oh, Eliot, Eliot! Come here, quick!" She was stooping over the bed inspecting some clean clothes that had been sent in from the laundry. Before she could straighten herself up to answer the call, her elbows were seized from behind, and Eugenia began waltzing her around backwards at a rate that made her head spin.
"Dance! You giddy old thing!" cried Eugenia. "Whoop and make a noise and act as if you are glad! We are going to get out of our cage next week. I'm invited to a house party. We are to spend a whole month in a house, not a hotel. We're going to be part of a real live family in a real sure enough home,--in an old Southern mansion."
"Goodness gracious, Miss Eugenia," panted Eliot, as she staggered into a chair and settled her cap on her head. "You a'most scared me out of me five wits, you were that sudden in your movements. I thought for a bit as you had gone stark mad. You gave me quite a turn, you did."
Eugenia laughed. "I had to let off steam in some way," she said; "and really, Eliot, you can't imagine how glad I am. They're cousins of papa's, you know, the Shermans are. I used to know Lloyd when they lived in New York. We played together every day, and fussed--my eyes, how we fussed! But that was before she could talk plain, and she must be eleven now, for she's about two years younger than I am."
Perching herself on the bed among piles of snowy linen, Eugenia clasped her hands around her knees and began to tell all she could remember of the Little Colonel. Because there was no one else to confide in, she confided in the maid. Patient old Eliot listened to much family history that did not interest her and which she immediately forgot, and to many girlish rhapsodies over "Cousin Elizabeth," whom Eugenia declared was the dearest thing that ever drew the breath of life.
As Eugenia talked on, idly rocking herself back and forth on the bed, Eliot sorted the linen with deft fingers, laying some of it away in drawers, sweet with dainty sachets, and putting some aside that needed a stitch or two. Presently, as she listened, she found herself taking more interest in the country place that Eugenia described than in anything she had heard of since she said good-bye