“Cousin Kate?” gasped Joyce.

Mrs. Ware nodded.  “What would you think if I were to tell you that there has been a box hidden away in my closet for nearly a week, waiting for this letter, which I knew was on its way, and inside are the very things you need to complete your summer outfit?  There is a new hat, for one thing, and material for several very pretty dresses.”

Mary danced up and down, her hair ribbons bobbing over her shoulders, and her face ashine, as she cried, “Oh, sister, isn’t it lovely?  I’m so glad, I’m so glad, I’m so glad!”

But Joyce stood with her face suddenly grown serious and her lips trembling.  Her little sister’s unselfish delight made her conscience hurt.  Putting her arms around her mother’s neck, she hid her face against her shoulder.  “Oh, mother,” she sobbed, “I don’t deserve it all!  Here I’ve been so fretful and discontented all day, thinking there’d never be any good times any more, and that there was nothing but work ahead of me, and all the time this beautiful surprise was on its way.  I don’t deserve for it to be mine.  It ought to be Mary’s.  She never frets over things.”

Mrs. Ware looked down into Mary’s face, still a-smile with the thought of her sister’s pleasure, and said:  “Mary is to have a little slice of this, too.  I wonder what she will say when she sees a certain pink parasol that I saw in that box, and a white sash with pink rosebuds on it, and slippers that I’m sure wouldn’t fit anything else in the house but her own wigglesome little feet.”

Mary’s hands came together ecstatically, with a long-drawn “Oh!” Then she clasped her mother around the knees, demanding, breathlessly: 

“Anything for Holland in that box?”

“Yes.”

“Anything for Jack?”

“Yes.”

“Anything for the baby?”

Mrs. Ware nodded.

“And you?”

Another nod.

“Then there isn’t a single word in the dictionary good enough to fit!” screamed Mary, excitedly, spinning around and around in the kitchen floor until the red ribbons stood out at right angles from her head.  “There isn’t a single word, Holland; we’ll just have to squeal!”

At that she gave a long, ear-piercing shriek that seemed to go through the roof like a fine-pointed needle.  Holland and the baby joined in, each trying to make a louder noise than the other.  Their eyes were tightly shut, their mouths wide open, and their faces red to bursting.

“There, there, children!” exclaimed Mrs. Ware, laughingly, as they stopped to take breath.  “The neighbours will think that the house is on fire.  We’ll have a policeman after us if you make such a noise.”

“The kettle is boiling over!” cried Holland, and Joyce flew to the rescue.  Jack went to change his wet clothes, and the three smaller children trotted back and forth, pushing chairs to the table, and helping to carry in the supper.