The naming of the Terrace was a happy accident. It must have been an
accident, for Jenkins Avenue crossed it at right angles, and just to the
north ran Sixtieth Street. No one could have guessed when the Terrace
was laid out that the name would prove so appropriate, and that the
comfortable cottages would have such a cordial, neighborly look, as if
nodding greetings to one another across their neat strips of lawn. When
the name Friendly Terrace appeared on the street lamps at the corner
there were no smiling faces visible at the front windows of the houses,
no plump babies rolling over the lawns, no girls gathering on one
another’s porches, like robins in the boughs of a cherry tree, or
strolling along the sidewalk, two by two, with their arms about each
other’s waists. The naming of the Terrace must have been a happy
accident, or else an inspiration.
There was usually a girl in evidence on Friendly Terrace at any hour of
the day, and this morning there were three of them. They ranged from
tall Priscilla, who was five feet seven, and mortally afraid of growing
taller, down to Amy, who was almost as broad as she was long, and who
was in a chronic state of announcing her determination to leave off
eating candy next week. Ruth, who on this occasion served as the
connecting link between the two extremes, was a slender girl, whose
alert air told plainly that she was on the watch for something or
somebody.
"Once when my Aunt Fanny was coming to make us a visit," Amy observed
reminiscently, "her train was six hours late. Just think if Peggy’s
train--"
"Don’t!" exclaimed Priscilla rather fretfully, and Ruth said with
decision, "O Peggy’s train couldn’t be late, she’s coming such a tiny
bit of a way."
"It might be if there was a wreck," Amy insisted triumphantly. "That
was the matter when Aunt Fanny came. A freight train was wrecked just
ahead of them, and they had to stand on the track for hours and hours.
We waited luncheon for her till I was almost starved."
The other girls exchanged amused smiles. The thought of Amy, undergoing
the pangs of starvation, was likely to present itself in a humorous
light. Amy saw the look and understood it, but was far from being
offended. In point of disposition, Amy was as sweet as the confections
she was always on the point of denying herself. An appreciative giggle
showed that she understood her friends’ point of view.
"That’s always the way," she said, with unimpaired cheerfulness. "Fat
people never get any sympathy." She stopped abruptly, for Ruth had
uttered a stifled scream and was pinching her arm.
"The hack!" cried Ruth. "The hack’s coming. Peggy’s here."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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