Even in Missy's room there was a little bowl of jade-green pottery, a colour which harmonized admirably with sweet peas, late roses, nasturtiums, or what-not. And all the furniture in that room was painted white, while the chintz bloomed with delicate little nosegays.
The one inharmonious element was that of Uncle Charlie's indisposition--not only the fact that he was suffering, but also the nature of his ailment. For Uncle Charlie, it developed, had been helping move a barrel of mixed-pickles in the grocery department of his store, and the barrel had fallen full-weight upon his foot and broken his big toe. Missy realized that, of course, a tournament with a sword-thrust in the heart, or some catastrophe like that, would have meant a more dangerous injury; but--a barrel of pickles! And his big toe! Any toe was unromantic. But the BIG toe! That was somehow the worst of all.
Uncle Charlie, however, spoke quite openly of the cause of his trouble. Also of its locale. Indeed, he could hardly have concealed the latter, as his whole foot was bandaged up, and he had to hobble about, very awkwardly, with the aid of a cane.
Uncle Charlie's indisposition kept him from accompanying Missy and Aunt Isabel to an ice-cream festival which was held on the Congregational church lawn that first night. Aunt Isabel was a Congregationalist; and, as mother was a Presbyterian and grandma a Methodist, Missy was beginning to feel a certain kinship with all religions.
This festival proved to be a sort of social gathering, because the Congregational church in Pleasanton was attended by the town's “best” people. The women were as stylishly dressed as though they were at a bridge party--or a tournament. The church lawn looked very picturesque with red, blue and yellow lanterns--truly a fair lawn and “well victualled” with its ice-cream tables in the open. Large numbers of people strolled about, and ate, and chatted and laughed. The floating voices of people you couldn't see, the flickering light of the lanterns, the shadows just beyond their swaying range, all made it seem gay and alluring, so that you almost forgot that it was only a church festival.
A big moon rose up from behind the church-tower, a beautiful and medieval-looking combination. Missy thought of those olden-time feasts “unto kings and dukes,” when there was revel and play, and “all manner of noblesse.” And, though none but her suspected it, the little white-covered tables became long, rough-hewn boards, and the Congregational ladies' loaned china became antique-looking pewter, and the tumblers of water were golden flaskets of noble wine. Missy, who was helping Aunt Isabel serve at one of the tables, attended her worshipful patrons with all manner of noblesse. She was glad she was wearing her best pink mull with the brocaded sash.