“Only dinner is ready,” suggested mother again; and all through the meal the talk was about Betty’s voyage home, with its exciting storm, and her visit to Harding, with Georgia’s gargoyle party and Mary Brooks’s absurd methods of housekeeping as main features of interest. The minute dinner was over the smallest sister caught Betty around the waist, and whispered something in her ear. “All right, dear,” Betty promised. “You shan’t have to wait another minute to see what I’ve brought you.” And they all, except Will and Mr. Wales, who preferred the library and the evening papers, adjourned to Betty’s room to help unpack. “Such a mess!” she sighed, as she uncovered the top tray. “You see I took out some things on shipboard, and then Mary and Roberta and Bob and Georgia all wanted to see what we’d brought home, and of course I was in too much of a rush to put things back straight. Besides, it wasn’t worth while to be particular, when all my clothes need mending or pressing or something. Move back, little sister, so I can have room for the Katie pile. It’s going to be about all Katie pile, I’m afraid.” “Is the Katie pile what you want Katie to fix in the sewing-room?” inquired the smallest sister. “Because we haven’t got Katie any more, so you’ll have to call it something else.” “Haven’t got Katie any more!” Betty’s face wore an expression of blank amazement. “Has Katie left?” “I thought we could get on without her,” Mrs. Wales explained hastily. “I have so little to do, now that my girls are all grown up. Dorothy is going to help me mend stockings this winter, aren’t you, dear?” The smallest sister nodded impressively. “I’ll help you mend your Katie pile too, Betty. Katie has gone to the Elingwoods’ to live, and she likes it, but she says it’s not the same thing, and when times are better she’ll be glad of it, because then she’ll come right back here.” “You see it’s this queer horrid panic, Betty,” Nan explained. “Father hasn’t actually lost much, I imagine; but business is bad, and so we’re trying to economize.” “And you never told me!” Betty looked reproachfully at her mother. Mrs. Wales laughed. “No, dear. Why should we? Anyway it’s all come up lately, since we got back from the shore. Even now there’s really nothing to tell, except that everybody is talking hard times and father’s business is dull. I’m very sorry it happened this season, because I meant you to be very gay your first winter at home, and now we can’t do much formal entertaining.” Betty’s face clouded as she remembered a house-party she had planned for the “Merry Hearts.” Luckily, she hadn’t mentioned it; it was to have been a grand surprise to everybody. Then a horrible thought swept everything else out of her head. “Oh, mother dear,” she began, “perhaps I ought to teach too, like Nan. I don’t believe I could, ever in the world, but I suppose every college girl ought to be able to, and I could try.”