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Page 22
"This isn't a letter, dear Marjorie Mops, It's only a promise of
Peppermint Drops!"
"Every one is nicer than the last! And now for the very last one
of all!"
Marjorie cut open the fourth envelope, and read:
"Dear Mopsy Midget, this isn't a letter; It's only a promise of
something much better!"
"Why, it doesn't say what!" exclaimed Midge, but even as she
spoke, Jane came into the room bringing a tray.
She set it on the table at Marjorie's bedside, and Marjorie gave a
scream of delight when she saw a cut-glass bowl heaped high with
pink ice cream.
"Oh, Uncle Steve!" she cried, "the ice cream is the 'something
better,' I know it is, and those other parcels are the other three
promises! Can I open them now?"
Almost without waiting for her question to be answered, Marjorie
tore off papers and strings, and found, as she fully expected, a
box of chocolate creams, a box of peppermint drops, and a lovely
new story book.
Then Grandma came in to their tea party and they all ate the ice
cream, and Marjorie declared it was the loveliest afternoon tea
she had ever attended.
Even Puff was allowed to have a small saucer of the ice cream, for
she was a very dainty kitten, and her table manners were quite
those of polite society.
But the next afternoon Uncle Steve was obliged to go to town, and
Marjorie felt quite disconsolate at the loss of the jolly
afternoon hour.
But kind-hearted Grandma planned a pleasure for her, and told her
she would invite both Stella Martin and Molly to come to tea with
Marjorie from four till five.
Marjorie had not seen Stella since the day they came up together
on the train, and the little girls were glad to meet again. Stella
and Molly were about as different as two children could be, for
while Molly was headstrong, energetic, and mischievous, Stella was
timid, quiet, and demure.
Both Marjorie and Molly were very quick in their actions, but
Stella was naturally slow and deliberate. When they played games,
Stella took as long to make her move as Molly and Midge together.
This made them a little impatient, but Stella only opened her big
blue eyes in wonder and said, "I can't do things any faster." So
they soon tired of playing games, and showed Stella their paper-
dolls' houses. Here they were the surprised ones, for Stella was
an adept at paper dolls and knew how to draw and cut out lovely
dolls, and told Marjorie that if she had a paintbox she could
paint them.
"I wish you would come over some other day, Stella, and do it,"
said Midge; "for I know Uncle Steve will get me a paint-box if I
ask him to, and a lot of brushes, and then we can all paint. Oh,
we'll have lots of fun, won't we?"
"Yes, thank you," said Stella, sedately.
Marjorie giggled outright. "It seems so funny," she said, by way
of explanation, "to have you say 'yes, thank you' to us children;
I only say it to grown people; don't you, Molly?"
"I don't say it at all," confessed Molly; "I mean to, but I 'most
always forget. It's awful hard for me to remember manners. But it
seems to come natural to Stella."
Stella looked at her, but said nothing. She was a very quiet
child, and somehow she exasperated Marjorie. Perhaps she would not
have done so had they all been out of doors, playing together, but
she sat on a chair by Marjorie's bedside with her hands folded in
her lap, and her whole attitude so prim that Marjorie couldn't
help thinking to herself that she'd like to stick a pin in her. Of
course she wouldn't have done it, really, but Marjorie had a
riotous vein of mischief in her, and had little use for excessive
quietness of demeanor, except when the company of grown-ups
demanded it.
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