Page:Stella Dallas, a novel (IA stelladallasnove00prou).pdf/232

222 work-bags, began plying various tools—knitting-needles, crochet-hooks, and tatting-bobbins; conversing the while lazily, meanderingly, breaking into shrill peals of laughter, now and then, or fragment of popular song.

Laurel lay back, flat on the ground, idle, her hands folded under her head, and gazed up at the murmuring tops of the trees. She wished her mother might be hiding up there among the needles, gazing down at her through the gaps, seeing, hearing.

Deborah, seated beside Laurel, was tickling her nose with a spear of field grass, Laurel attempting to catch it in her mouth by occasional puppy-like snaps. Frances on the other side was amusing herself by weaving pine needles through the meshes of Laurel's sweater. "I'll pay you back, somehow," purred Laurel contentedly.

Now they were telling her about the theatricals they gave every year in August, discussing what sort of a rôle would be best suited to her; now describing the delights of the night she would spend on the top of Spear Mountain before the season was over; now commanding her to make herself useful and sit up and help wind some yarn.

Oh, was it all true? Did they like her a little? Were they her friends? It seemed to Laurel that afternoon, as the shadows grew longer on the western margin of the lake and the hour for the homeward paddle with Richard Grosvenor through those shadows, approached, that her cup of happiness was full to the brim.