The door stood a little ajar and Lucia, having difficulty in stifling her sobs, suddenly rose and ran toward it, to close it, as Betty guessed. Lucia had merely pushed it to before they had cuddled down in the cushions. But as she grasped the ornate bronze handle, the first notes of something beautiful sounded upon the piano below. Lucia stopped, caught her breath as one does after crying, mopped her eyes again and stood still to listen. After a sparkling prelude, a voice began to sing.

Betty sat up at once. “Oh, that lovely voice, Lucia. Who is it?” Betty had in mind the ladies who were around that dinner table. This was a clear soprano voice, haunting and full of feeling as the song went on.

Lucia turned and softly said, “My Mother.” She waited a few moments and then ran into her bathroom to bathe her tear-stained face. But Betty went over to the door to listen till the song was over. It was nothing that she knew—some Italian song, but Betty felt an ache at her heart. Who was this that could sing like that? Betty had seen the countess in several different moods or phases—that of the capable traveler, the efficient mother when Lucia came home after her slight injury upon the hike, the pleasant, well-poised, gracious hostess—now here was something else.

The song was finished. When Betty heard the voices in conversation again, she closed the door and went back to where her books were, looking over her lesson till Lucia came back. Lucia was smiling and said that it was “all over.”

“I’m not going to be silly and cry again, Betty, but I shall probably want to talk to you about this some more. Here are some of my father’s letters. I keep them in my desk, you see. See how fat they are? He tells me about the hunts and the going through that queer country and everything that he thinks would interest me and help me to learn about it. Sometimes he puts in little things that I know he thinks my mother may read.”

Betty took in her hands a letter that Lucia handed her. It was, of course, written in Italian and very “fat,” as Lucia said. “I don’t think that you were silly to cry, Lucia. I don’t see how you can help feeling as you do. Your father must be a very interesting man and your mother is certainly a gifted woman.”

“Mother was studying music in Milan when she met my father, you know.”

Some slight progress had been made in lessons, but the girls retired earlier than Betty had supposed they would, for when the maid came in after rapping, upon some little errand of Lucia’s clothing, Lucia told her that she was tired and would go to bed very soon. Betty was only too glad to do the same thing and the girls soon said goodnight. In a comfortable bed, under white blankets and a silken comforter, as Betty noticed, she soon fell to sleep. It was nice to have a maid fussing around to do things for you, to open your window just the right amount, arranging a little screen of some sort, to see that your clothing was placed properly. But maids weren’t mothers!

Breakfast the girls had alone, as they rose earlier than either the countess or Mr. Murchison. Lucia told Betty that it was unusually early for her on a Saturday morning, but if they did “Christmas shopping,” they were wise to have a good start, as the stores would be full of people. Moreover, the countess herself would want the chauffeur to drive her down later in the day.

“Mother will sleep till noon, I suppose,” said Lucia, “because I think everybody stayed late last night. Uncle will drive his coupe down town, and we can have Horace and the big car all morning.”

The plans for shopping were made. Betty informed Lucia that for a president of Lyon “Y” she knew little about the usual plans for Christmas, but that the committee had asked her to buy certain things. Both girls had also personal shopping to do and it was like shopping with a fairy godmother to go with Lucia. She insisted on paying from her own purse for the materials Betty had been asked to buy. She bought half a dozen more dolls because she thought them “cute.” These were dressed. Betty still felt dubious about what the committee would think, but after all wouldn’t some “kiddie” love them!

It was a rather delirious morning for Betty. If she had not had a list, she would have been too excited to think properly, she said. When she told Lucia that the Lyon “Y” had adopted a family and related the story of the Thanksgiving baskets, Lucia began to buy toys “regardless,” Betty told her.

“Oh, let’s make them think old Santa just had a spill of toys from his old sleigh!” said Lucia, as happy as Betty, looking into the gayly decked windows, or descending into the store basements where the toys were displayed.

Betty had “always” intended to go back to see what was the result with the “Sevillas,” but there was so much to do at school with lessons and tests and other duties and at home in preparation for the holidays that she had not “had a minute” to spare, it seemed. Her father was unusually busy, too; and when she spoke to him about the coincidence of the names and referred to the odd parenthesis in Ramon Balinsky’s letter, he had only said that it “might be well to look into it.”

The crimson car was pretty well filled with packages when Lucia had finished her shopping, for why should they wait to have things delivered when they wanted to see them right away? And Lucia sent the car home, telling Betty that her mother might want it and that there was no use in keeping Horace waiting around while they had lunch down town.

Betty assured Lucia that any arrangement was satisfactory to her, as they entered a pretty tea room and lingered over their lunch, ordered by Lucia after consultation with Betty. Chicken salad and toothsome desserts figured largely in the order and Betty was sure that she would want nothing that afternoon; yet Lucia was serving such a “complete” afternoon tea! But a few hours make a great difference in young appetites.

Clothes bothered Betty a little. She hoped that her frock was proper for an “afternoon dress;” but she felt sure that many of the girls would not dress elaborately, in spite of their coming to a house presided over by a countess. Some of the girls could not, she knew.

When Miss Street and Miss Hogarth arrived in pretty but quiet frocks, Betty felt that everybody would be “all right” for clothes. Lucia herself must have had ideas on the subject; for she wore a dress that she had worn to school. Mathilde and a few of the late joiners, who had been largely influenced by Lucia’s membership, were more or less elaborately dressed; but clothes ceased to have much part in Betty’s thoughts, as she consulted with Miss Street and Miss Hogarth and the committee about the meeting. The countess came in to welcome the girls and their leaders most cordially. She well knew that the girls would have felt defrauded if they had not had a glimpse of her, as Betty gleaned from some little remark she made to Lucia. Two sewing machines were in the rear drawing room and Giovanna and Lina, in pretty caps and aprons were ready for work.

This arrangement was a surprise to Miss Street and Miss Hogarth, who thanked the countess warmly and remarked that they might have planned to have something beside clothes for dolls sewed that afternoon if they had realized what an opportunity it was. To this Countess Coletti replied that she would be glad to furnish machines and maids and house room some other time if the girls were sewing for the poor. She left the room with pleasant regrets and presently Betty heard the car starting to take her to some engagement or a shopping tour.

It was a petty scene, with the girls, their bright expressions and young figures, their thimbles and sewing bags or boxes, the little heaps of bright materials or filmy white or laces, wide or narrow, and dolls of all sorts, either in the girls’ laps or upon the tables. On the walls above them were several fine reproductions of famous paintings and an etching or two. Objects of art had largely been removed from this room to make place for chairs and folding tables and the machines. It seemed a pity to drop any threads or scraps upon that “gorgeous” oriental rug.

Betty clapped her hands for order. “While you get ready to begin sewing girls, Miss Street and Miss Hogarth will tell you what the plans are. The committee, too, may have some information to give you, and I’ll call on the chairman now to speak of them. I am too new as president to know much about what the ‘Y. W.’ does at Christmas time, except a few of the results. I will ask Lilian Norris to explain.”

Some of the girls were threading needles and beginning to sew on edges, or to fit little garments to their dolls, according to the state of progress to which the process had arrived.

“I’ve been talking to Miss Street and Miss Hogarth, girls, and this is what we are to do. You know we decided to adopt a family; and as the Woods family is such a nice one and needs everything so badly, our leader thinks we might as well take them. Please put it to vote, Betty, and then I’ll tell the rest.”

Betty, widely smiling at Lilian’s business-like methods, put the question, with a unanimous “Aye” as the result.

“That is good,” said Lilian. “We filled two baskets as it happened, at Thanksgiving, and we were told that both of them ‘went to the spot.’ Miss Hogarth called afterwards, but the Sevillas, who were the other people, very proud and not asking for any help, had moved; and the Woods lady did not know where they had gone.”

At this Betty had a pang. Suppose they were connected with Ramon—and she had neither gone to ask them nor written to him! That was the way a body perhaps missed a big opportunity.

But Lilian was still speaking. “I think, girls, that we should be very careful, too, about what we say about our family. They are like us in wanting to be independent and because they haven’t the good luck we have, there is no need of rubbing it in by telling everybody about them or what we do. Let’s have a little sympathy and delicacy!

“And now I’ll tell about the dolls. As you know, we bought some just alike and passed them around to be dressed, each girl paying, however, for her own doll. But then we had the membership drive and a lot of new members and we decided, that is, the committee did, that everybody could select her own doll. And these are not to be sent out with baskets, girls. They are to be for the Toy Shop that we are going to have at the ‘Y,’ and sold. There is to be a prize given for the best-dressed and the prettiest doll in the show—I forgot to say that we’re going to have big Christmas doings at the ‘Y’ down town—and I do hope that our group gets the prize for the prettiest doll and the foxiest booth! The prize is just some decoration or something in the way of an honor, you know. I think that is all, Madam President.”

Betty, who was very glad of this explanation, which corrected her own ideas about the dolls, called on the two leaders to ask if they had anything to tell the girls. Both of them confirmed Lilian’s statements and urged the girls to make this the most beautiful Christmas they had ever had, for themselves and for others, with their thoughts on higher motives than merely what material things they could get for themselves. Miss Hogarth asked for the names of those who were willing to take part in the carols and those who could furnish machines. Lucia’s hand went up to both questions and Betty felt a little warmth about her heart to see how sweet Lucia’s face had grown as she listened to Miss Hogarth’s brief references to the higher ideals. Perhaps trouble was not so bad for Lucia after all. And it all must turn out right for her!

The rest of the afternoon was a jumble of visiting and sewing. The presence of the maids and the machines called for more efficiency than probably would have been shown in an ordinary meeting. Fingers flew. The committee and Miss Street measured and cut out little garments from the “dearest” little doll patterns, bought that morning by Lucia and Betty, who risked sizes and thought that Giovanna, at least, could reduce or enlarge when necessary. The machines hummed away and the two maids seemed to have as much fun as anybody, particularly as Lucia treated them “just like family,” according to Mathilde, who was properly shocked. Mathilde, while “sweet as sugar” to Lucia, according to Dotty Bradshaw, could say some very funny things about her. “I wouldn’t care for such a friend,” said Dotty.

Betty had dropped down by Dotty, who wanted to know whether she thought a certain scrap of pretty lace would make a good finish for the neck of the doll dress she was making, or whether a little embroidered collar would be more suitable to the pattern. Betty gave her opinion on this weighty question and then Dotty informed her that Mathilde was “going to ask her if Lucia’s father and mother were going to get a divorce.”

“I thought I’d better warn you, Betty,” said Dotty, “I thought Mathilde chose a funny place to talk about it—Lucia’s own house.”

Betty smiled. Could Dotty be curious, too? “Thanks, Dotty. Yes, it isn’t usually done, talking about your hostess—or talking about people who have just been entertaining you. If I knew, I should scarcely give any information to Mathilde or anybody else. I’m having such a lovely visit and I’m sure the more we know Lucia the better we’ll like her. And isn’t it great of Countess Coletti to take such an interest in ‘good works?’ Oh, yes, Selma, I’ll bring you that pattern in just a minute. I think Peggy Pollard is using it now.”

Betty did not try to do any sewing herself. She would finish her doll at home. But Lucia, whose doll had not been brought downstairs, came to ask her if she should display it.

“I’m afraid the girls will think I’m trying to show off if I do, but several of them have asked me where my doll is and I had to tell them I had one. I shouldn’t have gotten such an—elaborate one, I suppose; but I did not think and I always choose what I think is the prettiest. What do you think, Betty?”

“I think that you must decide for yourself, Lucia. It does seem a perfect shame that they should not see that pretty thing!”

Lucia looked thoughtful and disappeared from the room for a short time. But Betty noted on her return that she was not carrying the doll; and at her first opportunity Lucia explained. “I did think that perhaps I would bring it down. Giovanna is going to dress it for me—or was. But just as I had it out of its box Bessie came running down from upstairs and said that Grandmother Ferris had asked about it. She had ‘Willie’ but where did ‘Josie’ go? Josie was another of her children that died. Isn’t it pitiful? So I just sent Bessie back with the other doll and I hope that they are having a quiet time putting baby clothes on it. I’ll send Lina up as soon as we serve. I think it would be nice to have some of the girls serve and do it myself, don’t you?”

“Yes, I do, Lucia,” emphatically answered Betty. “How is the grandmother today?”

“Just as quiet and happy as can be most of the time, Bessie says, only awfully bewildered. Help me choose the girls, Betty.”

Betty shook her head in the negative, and with a smile advised Lucia to choose the girls that would care most about it.

Lucia gave Betty a bright glance and laughed. Mathilde and two of her friends were among the first asked, Betty saw. She was not needed herself and helped to gather up the precious materials and scraps, distributing them to one and another of the girls. Thimbles were put away and sewing bags laid upon the tables while the conversation did not wane. The girls selected by Lucia to help her were chiefly for ornament; for Mathilde sat at the decorated table in the dining room, to pour chocolate from a silver urn, and the other girls passed the first plates and then sat down, with the rest about the room, to enjoy their own. The careful butler and several maids appeared to do the rest of it, though Lucia and the other girls passed cakes from pretty containers on the table, for a second time. It was all most delightful and from Lucia’s standpoint very informal.

The countess came home early and was again gracious enough to appear and speed the parting guests, standing by Lucia as the girls thanked her for their good time as well as for her help to the group. “We are certainly delighted, Lucia,” said Lilian Norris, “that you have come into Lyon ‘Y’ and hope you’ll not regret it. We’ll not ask too much of you. This has been wonderful.”

“It does not hurt any of us, my dear,” said Countess Coletti, “to try to help a little.”