practise her music lesson for fear of making
her mother's headache worse. She could not go near the kitchen, where she
might have found entertainment, for Aunt Cindy was in one of her black
tempers, and scolded shrilly as she moved around among her shining tins.

There was no one to show her how to begin her new piece of embroidery;
Papa Jack had forgotten to bring out the magazines she wanted to see;
Walker had failed to roll the tennis-court and put up the net, so she
could not even practise serving the balls by herself.

When lunch-time came, it was so lonely eating by herself in the big
dining-room, that she hurried through the meal as quickly as possible, and
tiptoed up the stairs to the door of her mother's room. Mom Beck raised
her finger with a warning "Sh!" and seeing that her mother was still
asleep, Lloyd stole away to her own room, her own pretty pink and white
nest, and curled herself up among the cushions in a big easy chair by the
window.

It was the first time in her memory that her mother had been ill. For more
than a week she had not been able to leave her room, and the lonely child,
accustomed to being with her constantly, crept around the house like a
little stray kitten. The place scarcely seemed like home, and the days
were endless. Some unusual feeling of sensitiveness had kept her from
reminding the family of her birthday. Other years she had openly counted
the days, for weeks beforehand, and announced the gifts that she would be
most pleased to receive.

Here by the window the dismal crow thoughts began flocking down to her
again, and to drive them away she picked up a book from the table and
began to read. It was a green and gold volume of short stories, one that
she had read many times before, but she never grew tired of them.

The one she liked best was "Marguerite's Wonder-ball," and she turned to
that first, because it was the story of a happy birthday. Marguerite was a
little German girl, learning to knit, and to help her in her task her
family wound for her a mammoth ball of yarn, as full of surprise packages
as a plum cake is of plums. Day by day, as her patient knitting unwound the
yarn, some gift dropped out into her lap. They were simple things, nearly
all of them. A knife, a ribbon, a thimble, a pencil, and here and there
a bonbon, but they were magnified by the charm of the surprise, and they
turned the tedious task into a pleasant pastime. Not until her birthday
was the knitti