Polly May Dudley.

P.S.  Patricia has just gone.  She brought some news.  Doodles is going to be soprano soloist in the boy choir at Trinity Church!  Isn’t that worth while!  Of course, it is Mr. Randolph’s doing.  He is one of the head men there, and what he says, goes.  He thinks Doodles’s singing is about right.  So Nita will hear him every Sunday.  Mother says you’ll have to stay home from school the day you read this, for there won’t be time for anything else.  More love from

  Polly.

CHAPTER XXXVII

HOLLY AND MISTLETOE

June Holiday Home awoke early on the 24th of December, for everybody—­which means fifteen of the residents—­was going to spend the day with Mrs. Randolph.  “From directly after breakfast until midnight,” the invitation ran, and the president’s car was to be at the Home by eight o’clock.

Such a profusion of curls and crimps, of new dresses and waists and fichus, added to new shoes and hats and coats, would have shocked the former superintendent of the Home; but Miss Churchill and Miss Ely even offered their services in the putting on of frills and furbelows, to the astonishment of those not yet grown familiar with kindness.

Mrs. Post, being unable to walk, had at first considered herself as entirely out of the fun; but Mrs. Randolph won the enduring love of that eldest member of the Home circle by saying that she should send an extra man with the chauffeur, so that Mrs. Post might have no fears regarding her trip from Edgewood Avenue to Courtney Street.

The Randolph home looked a bower of Christmas greenery and blossoms when the guests entered it that chill morning.

“My! isn’t it beautiful!” cried Miss Crilly, sniffing the pungent, woodsy odors.  “Smells like you were right there!” She grasped her hostess by the shoulders.  “Now, solemn true!  Aren’t you the happiest mortal on earth?”

Mrs. Randolph smiled, blushing a little, too.

“I don’t know how happy other people may be,” she answered; “I only hope that they are as happy as I am.”

“There!  I knew it!” Miss Crilly exulted, as if she had just disclosed a secret.

The others laughed, the thin ice of conventionality was swept away, and at once all were merry.

“I think the new ladies wished they were coming when they heard us talking about it,” said Miss Mullaly.

“They said they were invited to spend the day with relatives,” returned the hostess.

“Yes, but they won’t have half so good a time as we shall.”  Miss Crilly wagged her head expectantly.  “They’ll just sit around stiff and poky—­most of them look as if they would.  Isn’t Polly coming, Mis’ Randolph?”

“This evening.”

“Won’t that be lovely!  She always makes things fly!”