Now it was Maida’s turn.  She took the candle and the mirror from Dicky and plunged into the shivery darkness of the stairs.  It was doubly difficult for her to go down backwards because of her lameness.  But she finally arrived at the bottom and stood there expectantly.  It seemed a long time before anything happened.  Suddenly, she felt something stir back of her.  A lighted jack-o’-lantern came from between the folds of a curtain which hung from the ceiling.  It grinned over her shoulder at her face in the mirror.

Maida burst into a shriek of laughter and scrambled upstairs.  “I’m going to marry a jack-o’-lantern,” she said.  “My name’s going to be Mrs. Jack Pumpkin.”

“I’m going to marry Laura’s sailor-doll,” Rosie confessed.  “My name is Mrs. Yankee Doodle.”

“I’m going to marry Laura’s big doll, Queenie,” Arthur admitted.

“And I’m going to marry Harold’s Teddy-bear,” Dicky said.

After that they blew soap-bubbles and roasted apples and chestnuts, popped corn and pulled candy at the great fireplace in the playroom.  And at Maida’s request, just before they left, Laura danced for them.

“Will you help me to get on my costume, Maida?” Laura asked.

“Of course,” Maida said, wondering.

“I asked you to come down here, Maida,” Laura said when the two little girls were alone, “because I wanted to tell you that I am sorry for the way I treated you just before I got diphtheria.  I told my mother about it and she said I did those things because I was coming down sick.  She said that people are always fretty and cross when they’re not well.  But I don’t think it was all that.  I guess I did it on purpose just to be disagreeable.  But I hope you will excuse me.”

“Of course I will, Laura,” Maida said heartily.  “And I hope you will forgive me for going so long without speaking to you.  But you see I heard,” she stopped and hesitated, “things,” she ended lamely.

“Oh, I know what you heard.  I said those things about you to the W.M.N.T.’s so that they’d get back to you.  I wanted to hurt your feelings.”  Laura in her turn stopped and hesitated for an instant.  “I was jealous,” she finally confessed in a burst.  “But I want you to understand this, Maida.  I didn’t believe those horrid things myself.  I always have a feeling inside when people are telling lies and I didn’t have that feeling when you were talking to me.  I knew you were telling the truth.  And all the time while I was getting well, I felt so dreadfully about it that I knew I never would be happy again unless I told you so.”

“I did feel bad when I heard those things,” Maida said, “but of course I forgot about them when Rosie told me you were ill.  Let’s forget all about it again.”

But Maida told the W.M.N.T.’s something of her talk with Laura and the result was an invitation to Laura to join the club.  It was accepted gratefully.