“That’s a ‘label’ on my ’sect’,” answered Laurie, quoting Amy, as he went to partake of humble pie dutifully with his grandfather, who was quite saintly in temper and overwhelmingly respectful in manner all the rest of the day.

Everyone thought the matter ended and the little cloud blown over, but the mischief was done, for though others forgot it, Meg remembered.  She never alluded to a certain person, but she thought of him a good deal, dreamed dreams more than ever, and once Jo, rummaging her sister’s desk for stamps, found a bit of paper scribbled over with the words, ‘Mrs. John Brooke’, whereat she groaned tragically and cast it into the fire, feeling that Laurie’s prank had hastened the evil day for her.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

PLEASANT MEADOWS

Like sunshine after a storm were the peaceful weeks which followed.  The invalids improved rapidly, and Mr. March began to talk of returning early in the new year.  Beth was soon able to lie on the study sofa all day, amusing herself with the well-beloved cats at first, and in time with doll’s sewing, which had fallen sadly behind-hand.  Her once active limbs were so stiff and feeble that Jo took her for a daily airing about the house in her strong arms.  Meg cheerfully blackened and burned her white hands cooking delicate messes for ‘the dear’, while Amy, a loyal slave of the ring, celebrated her return by giving away as many of her treasures as she could prevail on her sisters to accept.

As Christmas approached, the usual mysteries began to haunt the house, and Jo frequently convulsed the family by proposing utterly impossible or magnificently absurd ceremonies, in honor of this unusually merry Christmas.  Laurie was equally impracticable, and would have had bonfires, skyrockets, and triumphal arches, if he had had his own way.  After many skirmishes and snubbings, the ambitious pair were considered effectually quenched and went about with forlorn faces, which were rather belied by explosions of laughter when the two got together.

Several days of unusually mild weather fitly ushered in a splendid Christmas Day.  Hannah ‘felt in her bones’ that it was going to be an unusually fine day, and she proved herself a true prophetess, for everybody and everything seemed bound to produce a grand success.  To begin with, Mr. March wrote that he should soon be with them, then Beth felt uncommonly well that morning, and, being dressed in her mother’s gift, a soft crimson merino wrapper, was borne in high triumph to the window to behold the offering of Jo and Laurie.  The Unquenchables had done their best to be worthy of the name, for like elves they had worked by night and conjured up a comical surprise.  Out in the garden stood a stately snow maiden, crowned with holly, bearing a basket of fruit and flowers in one hand, a great roll of music in the other, a perfect rainbow of an Afghan round her chilly shoulders, and a Christmas carol issuing from her lips on a pink paper streamer.