The mail-bag came in as usual just after breakfast the next morning, but the number of letters was greatly reduced, of course, and there was no animated, chattering crowd standing about eagerly watching while Mrs. Abbott unlocked the padlock and distributed the letters.

Marion had never received a letter in her life, so she and Elfie walked past the hall-table where Mrs. Abbott was opening the bag without so much as a glance at it, but they had not reached the top of the stairs before Mr. Eaton called out:

“Letters for you, Marion.”

“Letters for me? O, no, they can’t be mine, they must be for some of the other girls.”

“But how very, very imbecile their correspondents must be to direct them to Miss Marion Stubbs!”—holding up two square envelopes, one white, the other robin’s-egg blue. “Don’t you think you’ll have to open them so as to see which of the girls they are really meant for? or shall I lay them away till vacation is over, and then put them up at auction?”

“He is teasing you, Marion,” said Mrs. Abbott, glancing up from the letter she was reading. “They are really for you.”

Such a pleasure actually to have letters of her own! Marion had often envied the girls when they clutched their letters from home and became absorbed in their contents, smiling, exclaiming, and sometimes almost crying, as their eyes devoured the home news. But poor Mrs. Stubbs, with her broken-down health and her never-ceasing work, had no time to write to her daughter, and even if she had it was so many years since she had written a letter that she would hardly know how to do it. As for her father and the little boys, they would cheerfully have killed a bear or a rattlesnake or even encountered a mad dog and conquered him, for their absent girl’s sake, but such a stupendous, overwhelming task as writing a letter was not even to be considered, and the well-written, dutiful, fortnightly letters which Marion duly sent to the humble mountain home were regarded with awe and wonder, and read again and again by her proud and affectionate family.

But there were actually letters for her to-day, and the joy of receiving them was so great that Marion laid them face up on her table and gloated over them, not for some time attempting to make them reveal their contents. When she did break the seal of the blue-tinted envelope she read these astonishing lines:

“My Dear Marion: You are coming to spend a week with me and go back to school with me and Lily—I mean Lily and me—that is, if you want to. Mamma said our house was going to be too empty at Christmas, and I might invite some girls. So I chose you and Lily, and mamma has written to Mrs. Abbott about it, and I do hope she will let you come.

“Ever your affectionate friend,
“Katherine Stowe Ashley.”

That stately signature did not seem like Katie, but Marion knew perfectly well whose hand wrote the invitation which filled her heart with rapture, not for the pleasure of anticipating a visit, for she was not sure she really wanted to go, but it was delicious to feel that she was wanted, and that dear, warm-hearted, loving Katie had chosen her when she might have asked Edna or Bell or any of the girls who were used to better ways of living and better society than she had known.

Mrs. Abbott, coming into her room with Elfie, a few moments later, found her plunged in a happy reverie, with the second letter still unopened.

“Listen, dear,” she said, sitting down by her side. “This letter of mine very nearly concerns you:

“New York, Madison Avenue, Dec. 20.

“My Dear Mrs. Abbott: Will you let Katie’s friend, Miss Marion Stubbs, come and spend a portion of the holidays with us?

“If you will let her come Mr. Ashley will meet her at the Grand Central Station on the 24th, if you will let us know the train.

“With kindest regards, yours very sincerely,

“E. T. Ashley.”

“You don’t look surprised!”

“No, I knew Mrs. Ashley had written to you;” and Marion handed Katie’s letter to her.

“Isn’t it good of them?” she asked, watching Mrs. Abbott’s face till she finished reading.

“Yes; I am glad you are to have such a treat, for I feared it would be dull for you here.”

“It could not be dull with you and Elfie and Mr. Eaton,” said Marion, “and I don’t know as I really want to go; I am afraid I shouldn’t know just how to act always, and I might make Katie ashamed before her friends.”

“That is doing Katie great injustice.”

“O, I don’t mean it that way,” exclaimed Marion, kissing her letter impulsively.

“I know you don’t; but, my dear child, you haven’t read your other letter!”

That was from Lily, and, as might be expected, was very funny. Smiles and dimples attended Marion’s reading of it, and when she had finished she handed it to Mrs. Abbott, who said:

“Wont you read it to me yourself, so that Elfie can enjoy it too?”

So Marion began:

“‘Dear Left-Behinder: It was brutal in us to go off and leave the dear little mountain maid all to herself, and Katie and I talked ourselves into a fury of sympathy after we got into the cars. The only comfort we had was in hoping Mr. Eaton would get there right away. He’s a dear!

“‘Now, I feel the spirit of poesy jumping onto me; attend, please.

“‘Old Coventry braes are bonny,

Where early falls the dew,

But that, my dear old Marion,

Is not the place for you.

“‘So give us your promise true,

That ne’er forgot shall be,

To do as Katie asks you,

And pack your trunk with glee.

“‘I don’t believe I can do the subject justice in poetry, so I’ll go back to prose. Do come, Maid Marion. You must; if you don’t you shall be black-balled next term; that means something awful. I feel in my bones that you will try not to come, but you must.

“‘I want to tell you something. We heard Edna say in the cars that Mrs. Ashley went in the best set in New York, and she’d give any thing if her mother knew her. Now, don’t that make you want to show Edna (spiteful humbug) what you can do. It will be just fun to see her rage about it next term.

“‘If you dare to say no you’ll break my heart. I shall think it’s because I am going to be there. Katie was always nice to you, but I was horrid, just wicked, and even if you did forgive me no one can blame you if you can’t forget. But if you don’t come I shall just be a raving wreck, and I wont go to Katie’s if you don’t. So, there now, I have said it.

“‘O, what a naughty thing you’d be,

To plunge your friends in misery,

So come along and Christmas spend,

And likewise New Year’s, with your friend.

“‘(Plural understood; couldn’t say spends, so had to take the “s” off the friends. There’s awful limitations to poetry.)

“‘Katie hates writing letters so awfully that I told her if she’d just write the bare invitation I’d do the urging. Now, I’m sure I don’t know what more I can say to make you come; but if you dare to write a stiff little note beginning, “I am so sorry,” I’ll choke you, and I’ll send word to Mrs. Abbott to have you chloroformed and carried onto the cars with your feet tied, so you can’t kick when you come to.

“‘Don’t be afraid to come, for Katie’s mother is almost as sweet as Mrs. Abbott, and Mr. Ashley’s lovely. He almost shakes himself to bits laughing. I believe that’s why he’s so bald, he’s shaken all his hair off.

“‘Now you are coming, aren’t you?

“‘Yes, yes, yes, yes, say you are coming, my sweet,

To visit our Katie in Madison Street.

“‘(It isn’t street, it’s avenue, really, but I took poet’s license.)

“‘Now, farewell. Your loving

Lily.

“‘P. S.—O, do come.

“‘Particular P. S.—Come now, don’t say no.’”

Mrs. Abbott laughed heartily when the letter was read.

“I really think Lily is the most sprightly girl I ever had in my school.”

“I never saw any one I envied so much,” said Marion.

“You need not, dear. We all have different gifts, but that is not to say that one kind ranks above another. Lily’s vivacity leads her into trouble sometimes, and I have heard her say, when she has been suffering the consequences of her thoughtlessness, that she wished she was more like you in some things. But we will take a more convenient season for discussing gifts and traits. For now we must give our minds to shoes and clothes for this visit.”

“O, do you really think I had better go?”

“I am sure of it, and you and I and Liny must work hard; fortunately she can work nicely on the machine, and she has little else to do in vacation. When I was in New York I bought for your Christmas present a red cashmere dress and a brown plush sack that I tried on a girl about your size. I think we can get the woman who made Elfie’s dresses to give us to-morrow and the next day. So we shall turn out a very respectable little red-bird for a city visit.”