She longed to slip quietly away to her own room, and spend the evening in the dark with her memories. She had to wait a moment on the threshold before she could summon strength enough to go in cheerfully. Mrs. Marion and Lois were in the dining-room helping the sisters decorate the long table, where the children were to be served with supper immediately on their arrival. "Frank and Jack have gone out in a sleigh to gather them up," said Mrs. Marion. "They'll soon be here, so you'll not have much time to dress." "All right," responded Bethany, "I'll go in a minute. Mr. Herschel can't come, so you may as well take off one plate." "But George Cragmore can," said Miss Caroline, pausing on her way to the kitchen. "I asked him this morning, and forgot to say anything about it." Then she trotted out for a cake-knife, blissfully unconscious of the grimace Bethany made behind her back. "O dear!" she exclaimed to Lois, "Miss Caroline means all right, but she is a born matchmaker. She has taken a violent fancy to Mr. Cragmore, and wants me to do the same. She thinks she is so very deep, and so very wary in the way she lays her plans, that I'll never suspect; but the dear old soul is as transparent as a window-pane. I can see every move she makes." "What about Mr. Cragmore?" asked Lois. "Is he conscious of her efforts in his behalf?" "O no. He thinks that she is a dear, motherly old lady, and is always paying her some flattering attention. It is well worth his while, for she makes him perfectly at home here, keeps his pockets full of goodies, as if he were an overgrown boy (which he is in some respects), and treats him with the consideration due a bishop. She is always going out to Clarke Street to hear him preach, and quoting his sermons to him afterwards. There he is now!" she exclaimed, as two short rings and one long one were given the front door-bell. "So he even has his especial signals," laughed Lois. "He must be on a very familiar footing, indeed." "He got into that habit when he first started to calling by to take me up to the Hebrew class," she explained. "Miss Caroline encouraged him in it." Just then Miss Caroline came hurrying through the room to receive him. "Bethany, dear," she said in an excited stage whisper, "you'd better run up the back stairs. And do put on your best dress, and a rose in your hair, just to please me. Now, won't you?" Bethany and Lois looked at each other and laughed. "I'd like to shock her by going in just as I am," said Bethany; "but as it's Christmas-time I suppose I must be good and please everybody." It was not long before a great stamping of many snowy little feet announced the arrival of the Christmas guests. They came into the house with such rosy, happy faces, that no one thought of the patched clothes and ragged shoes.