CHAPTER XIV
AN EIGHTEENTH BIRTHDAY
Every American will always remember that winter of 1917 as being one ofextreme unrest. Would we or would we not be plunged into the World War?Should we get in the game or should we sit quietly by and see Germanyoverrun land and sea?
Valhalla was not too much out of the world to share in the excitement,and like most of the world was divided in its opinions. Douglas and herfather were for the sword and no more pens. Helen and Mrs. Carter feltit was a pity to mix up in a row that was not ours, although in hersecret soul Helen knew full well that the row was ours and if war was tobe declared she would be as good a fighter as the next. Nan was an outand out pacifist and declared the world was too beautiful to mar withall of this bloodshed. Lucy insisted that Nan got her sentiments fromCount de Lestis, who had been "hogging" a seat by her sister quite oftenin the weeks before that day in March when diplomatic relations withGermany were broken off by our country. As for Lucy: she could tell youall about the causes of the war and was quite up on Bismarck's policy,etc. She delighted her father with her knowledge of history and herlogical views of the present situation. She and Mag were determined togo as Red Cross nurses if we did declare war, certain that if theytucked up their hair and let down their dresses no one would dream theywere only fourteen. Bobby walked on his toes and held his head veryhigh, trying to look tall, hoping he could go as a drummer boy orsomething if he could only stretch himself a bit.
"Good news, girls!" cried Helen one evening in February when they haddrawn their seats around the roaring fire piled high with wood cut byMr. Carter, whose muscles were getting as hard as iron from his outdoorwork.
"What?" in a chorus from the girls, always ready for any kind of news,good or bad.
"The count is going to have a ball!"
"Really? When?"
"On the twenty-second of February! He says if he gives a party onWashington's birthday nobody can doubt his patriotism."
"Humph! I don't see what business he has with patriotism about ourWashington," muttered Lucy.
"But he does feel patriotic about the United States, he told me he did,"said Nan.
"I think he means to take out his naturalization papers in the nearfuture," said Mr. Carter.
"He tells me he feels very lonesome now that he is in a way debarredfrom his own country," sighed Mrs. Carter. "That book he wrote has madethe Kaiser very angry."
"Well, after the war is over that book will raise him in the estimationof all democracies," suggested Douglas.
"Mag says that Billy wrote to Brentano's to try and get him that bookand they say they can't find it; never heard of it," blurted out Lucy.
"It has perhaps not been translated into English," said Helen loftily.
"Mag says that that's no matter. Brentano will get you any old book inany old language if it is in existence."
"How can they when a book has been suppressed? I reckon the Kaiser isabout as efficient about suppressing as he is about everything else.Well, book or no book, I'm glad to be going to a ball. He says we mustask our friends from Richmond and he is going to invite everybody in thecounty and have a great big splendid affair, music from Richmond, andsupper, too."
"Kin I go?" asked Bobby, curling up in Helen's lap, a way he had ofdoing when there was no company to see him and sleep was getting thebetter of him.
"Of course you can, if you take a good nap in the daytime."
"Daddy and Mumsy, you will go, surely," said Douglas.
"Yes, indeed, if your mother wants to! I'm not much of a dancer thesedays, but I bet she can outdance any of you girls. Eh, Mother?"
"Not as delicate as I am now; but of course I shall go to the ball tochaperone my girls," said the little lady plaintively. "I doubt mydancing, however."
"He says we must ask Dr. Wright and Lewis and any other people we want.He says he is really giving this ball to us because we have been sohospitable to him," continued Helen.
"We haven't been any nicer to him than Miss Ella and Miss Louise," saidLucy, who seemed bent on obstructing.
"But they are too old to have balls given to them," laughed Helen. "Theyare going, though. I went to see them this afternoon with Count deLestis and they are just as much interested as I am. They asked theprivilege of making the cakes for the supper and he was so tactful thathe did not tell them he was to have a grand caterer to do the wholething. The old ladies just love to do it, and one is to make angel'sfood and one devil's food.
"The Suttons are going," and Helen held the floor without interruptionsbecause of the subject that was interesting to all the family. "Mr.Sutton says if the roads permit he will send his big car to take ourwhole family, and if the roads are too bum he will have the carriage outfor Mrs. Sutton and Mumsy, and all of us can go in the hay wagon."
"Grand! I hope the roads will be muddy up to the hubs!" cried Lucy. "Haywagons are lots more fun than automobiles."
"Hard on one's clothes, though," and Helen looked a little rueful. Thequestion of dress was important when one had nothing but old last year'sthings that were so much too narrow.
"What are you going to wear to the ball?" asked Douglas that night whenshe and Helen were snuggling down in their bed in the little room upunder the roof.
"I haven't anything but my rose chiffon. It is pretty faded looking andhopelessly out of style, but I am going to try to freshen it up a bit.Ah me! I don't mind working, but I do wish I were not an unproductiveconsumer. I'd like to make some money myself and sometimes buysomething."
Douglas patted her sister consolingly. "Poor old Helen! I do feel so badabout you."
"Well, you needn't! But I did see such a love of a dancing frock when wewere down town that day with Cousin Elizabeth: white tulle over a silvercloth with silver girdle and trimmings. It was awfully simple but soeffective. I could just see myself in it. I ought to be ashamed to letclothes make so much difference with me, but I can't help it. I ambetter about it than I was at first, don't you think?"
"I think you are splendid and I also think you have the hardest job ofall to do: working all the time and never making any money."
The next morning Douglas held a whispered conversation with Nan beforethey got off to their respective schools.
"See what it costs but don't let Helen know. She will be eighteentomorrow, and if it isn't worth a million, I am going to take some of mylast month's salary and get it for her."
When Nan, who was not much of a shopper, approached the great windows ofRichmond's leading department store, what was her joy to see the verygown that Douglas had described to her displayed on Broad Street andmarked down to a sum in the reach of a district school teacher.
"It looks so like Helen, somehow, that I can almost see her wearing itin place of the wax dummy," exclaimed Nan.
"Must I charge it, Miss Carter?" asked the pleasant saleswoman as shetook the precious dress out of the show-window.
"Please, Miss Luly, somehow I'd rather not charge it, but I haven't themoney today. Couldn't you fix it up somehow so I could take it with meand bring you the money tomorrow? We don't charge any more, but if Idon't buy it right now I'm so afraid somebody else might get it."
The smiling saleswoman, who had been waiting on the Carters ever sincethe pretty Annette Sevier came a bride to Richmond, held a conferencewith the head of the firm on how this could be managed.
"Miss Nan Carter is very anxious not to charge, but can't pay untiltomorrow."
"Ummm! A little irregular! What Carter is it?"
"Mr. Robert Carter's daughter!"
"Let her have it and anything else she wants on any terms she wishes.Robert Carter's name on a firm's books is the same as money in the bank.I have wondered why his account has been withdrawn from our store," andthe head of the firm immediately dictated a letter to his former patron,requesting in polite terms that he should run up as big a bill as hewished and that he could pay whenever he got ready. So very polite wasthe letter that one almost gathered he need not pay at all.
> Mr. Carter laughed aloud when he read the letter, remembering those daysnot yet a year gone by when the bills used to pile in on the first ofevery month and he would feel that they must be paid immediately and theonly way to do it was redouble his energy and work far into the night.
The flat box with the precious dancing dress was not an easy thing tocarry on stilts, but the lane was muddy and Nan had to do it somehow.With much juggling she got safely over the dangers of the road andsmuggled it into the house without Helen's seeing it.
"I got it!" Nan whispered to Douglas when she could get her alone.
"But you didn't have the money! I asked you to find out the pricefirst," said Douglas, fearing Nan, in her zeal, had overstepped thelimit in price. "I didn't want anything charged. I am so afraid we mightget started to doing it again."
"Never! I just kind of borrowed it until tomorrow. You see I struck asale and they couldn't save it for me because there were only a few ofthem. I told them I couldn't charge but would bring the money tomorrow,and Miss Luly fixed it up for me, somehow, and told me I could have thewhole department store on any terms I saw fit to dictate."
Morning dawned on Helen's eighteenth birthday but found her in not veryjubilant spirits. It isn't much fun to have an eighteenth birthday whenyou have to bounce out of bed and rush into your clothes to see that apoor ignorant country servant doesn't make the toast and scramble theeggs before she even puts a kettle of water on for coffee. Chloe alwaysprogressed backwards unless Helen was there to do the head work.
Helen found Chloe had already descended her perilous ladder and had thestove hot and the kettle on as a birthday present to her belovedmistress. Chloe really adored Helen and did her best to learn andremember. The breakfast table was set, too, and Chloe's eyes wereshining as though she had something to say but wild horses would notmake her say it.
The sisters came in at the first tap of the bell and her father was inhis place, too. Helen started to seat herself at her accustomed place,but at a shout from Lucy looked before she sat. Her chair was piled highwith parcels.
"Happy birthday, honey!" said Douglas.
"Happy birthday, daughter!" from Mr. Carter.
"Happy birthday! Happy birthday!" shouted all of them in chorus.
"Why, I didn't know anybody remembered!" cried Helen.
"Not remember your eighteenth birthday! Well, rather!" said Mr. Carter.
Then began the opening of the boxes while Chloe stood in the cornergrinning for dear life.
A pearl pin from Mrs. Carter, one she had worn when she first met herhusband, was in the small box on top. An old-fashioned filigree goldbracelet was Mr. Carter's gift. It had belonged to his mother, for whomHelen was named.
"It will look very lovely on your arm, my dear," he said when Helenkissed him in thanks.
Cousin Elizabeth Somerville had sent her ten dollars in gold; Lewis,some new gloves; there was a vanity box from Lucy with a saucy messageabout always powdering her nose; a little thread lace collar from Nan,made by her own hands; and to balance all was a five-pound box of candyfrom Dr. Wright.
"I had a big marble for you, but it done slipt out'n my pocket," saidBobby, and then he had to give a big hug and a kiss, which Helendeclared was better than even a marble.
"But you haven't opened your big box, the one at the bottom," insistedNan. It had got covered up with papers and Helen had overlooked it."Please hurry up and open it because Lucy and I have to beat it. It willbe train time before we know it."
As Helen untied the strings and unwrapped the tissue paper that waspacked around the contents of the big box you could have heard a pindrop in that dining-room at Valhalla. She eagerly pulled aside thepapers and then shook out the glimmering gown.
"Oh, Douglas! Douglas! You shouldn't have done it! It is even prettierthan I remembered it to be!"
"Mind out, don't splash on it," warned Nan just in time to keep the twogreat tears that welled up into Helen's eyes from spotting the exquisitecreation.
"My Miss Helen's gwinter look like a angel whin she goes ter de count'sjamboree," declared Chloe.
"Well, your Miss Douglas is the angel and she's going to have to have anew dress with slits in the shoulder-blades to let her wings comethrough," sobbed Helen, laughing at the same time as she held the dressup in front of her and danced around the table. She had thought nobodyremembered her eighteenth birthday and now found nobody had forgottenit.
"You shouldn't have afforded it, Douglas. I can't keep it. It would betoo selfish of me."
"Marked down goods not sent on approval," drawled Nan.