the curtain," said Molly Loo, as the girls talked it over one day,
when they sat with their backs turned to one another, putting last
stitches in certain bits of work which had to be concealed from all
eyes, though it was found convenient to ask one another's taste as
to the color, materials, and sizes of these mysterious articles.

"I think it is going to be a dance. I heard the boys doing their steps
when I went in last evening to find out whether Jack liked blue or
yellow best, so I could put the bow on his pen-wiper," declared
Merry, knitting briskly away at the last of the pair of pretty white
bed-socks she was making for Jill right under her inquisitive little
nose.

"They wouldn't have a party of that kind without Jack and me. It is
only an extra nice tree, you see if it isn't," answered Jill from
behind the pillows which made a temporary screen to hide the
toilet mats she was preparing for all her friends.

"Every one of you is wrong, and you'd better rest easy, for you
won't find out the best part of it, try as you may." And Mrs. Pecq
actually chuckled as she, too, worked away at some bits of muslin,
with her back turned to the very unsocial-looking group.

"Well, I don't care, we've got a secret all our own, and won't ever
tell, will we?" cried Jill, falling back on the Home Missionary
Society, though it was not yet begun.

"Never!" answered the girls, and all took great comfort in the idea
that one mystery would not be cleared up, even at Christmas.