“Oh, they are almost like mine,” cried Lloyd, fingering them admiringly.  Before Betty realised what was coming, she found them clasped on her neck, and Mrs. Sherman was saying:  “It isn’t made out of my heart’s blood by any means, and it will not lead you to any Prince Charming, but it is my privilege as godmother to lay a spell on them.  Let’s see how it will work.  Go over to that little trunk of yours in the corner, dear, and lay your hand on it.  Now shut your eyes while you repeat Olga’s charm, and see what will happen.”

Delighted by this dramatising of the old tale, Betty scrambled to her feet, ran across the room, and laid her hand on top of the shabby little leather trunk.  Shutting her eyes so tight that her nose wrinkled up like a kitten’s, while her mouth smiled broadly, she repeated the rhyme: 

     “For love’s sweet sake, in my hour of need,
      Blossom and deck me, little seed!”

As she opened her eyes, Lloyd, obeying a whisper from her mother, threw back the lid of the trunk.  All that Betty could utter, as she looked within, was a long-drawn cry of surprise:  “Oh-oo-oo!”

There, inside, lay a pile of light summer dresses, some white, and the rest in as many tints of pale pinks and blues and buffs and lilacs as could be found in a bunch of fresh sweet peas.  Below were glimpses of linen and lace and embroidery, and in the top tray two pretty hats.  One trimmed simply with rosettes of ribbon, the other a broad-brimmed leghorn with a wreath of forget-me-nots.

One look into Betty’s face was enough reward for Mrs. Sherman.  It was ample return for all the trouble she had taken.  What was the money expended and the discomforts of that tiresome morning that she shopped in town, or the many trips to the dressmaker’s, compared to the rapture in Betty’s shining eyes?  Mrs. Sherman had never seen such happiness, or heard such a gladness in a voice as when Betty cried out, “Oh, godmother!  Are you a witch?  It is too good to be true.  I thought I was coming to an ordinary house party, and I’ve walked straight into a real, live fairy tale!  Oh, I can never thank you enough!  Never, never, never.”  She threw her arms around her godmother’s neck and kissed her again and again.

Presently leaving Betty to gloat over her treasures by herself, Lloyd followed Mrs. Sherman out of the room.  “Now I see what you meant, mothah,” she said, “about the different ways of givin’ things.  It can’t hurt anybody’s pride if you make them feel that you give it for love’s sweet sake.  That was a beautiful way you did it, mothah, and I’ll never fo’get it.”

CHAPTER VII.

BITS FROM BETTY’S DIARY.

     “THE LOCUSTS,” June 4, 1900.

This morning when I sat down at my writing-desk to finish a letter to Davy, I found this little blank book, bound in white kid, with my initials on the back in gold letters.  When I first came, godmother heard me wishing that I could put a slice of my good times away in a box every day, and save it to take home and enjoy afterward, as people do fruit-cake sometimes, after Christmases and weddings.  So she has given me this pretty white book, and every day while I am in this House Beautiful I shall write something in it with this darling little pearl-handled pen.