Grown bold with their successful venture, Kitty proposed that each time the procession turned away from them, they should reach out and grab something from the table. It was an exciting performance. Time after time, as the motley figures turned their backs, two ludicrous heads popped up above the table, and four white woollen gloves clawed hastily at different dishes. When the marauders dropped from sight the last time, there was a goodly store of provisions gathered up in each gingham apron.
"I wouldn't have missed this for anything," giggled Katie some time later, when the unmasking began, and the girls crowded around the table for nuts and apples with which to try their fortunes. In such a babel of voices there was no danger of being overheard.
"Listen! we can tell from the different remarks who every one represented," they whispered to each other.
"Oh, Evelyn Ward, I knew all the time that you were the court lady. I recognized your rings."
"That's what fooled me about Aladdin. Susie Figgs had changed rings with Ada."
"Well, I guessed nearly everybody the first half-hour, except those ridiculous rag dolls. Does anybody know where they have gone?"
That started the discussion the two under the table had been waiting for, and the various guesses, falling wide of the mark, were so amusing that their mirth nearly betrayed their hiding-place. Once they thought their discovery was certain. They had been feeding themselves from the store of provisions in their aprons as well as the size of their muslin mouths would allow. The mouths had been only small slits at first, but they had stretched and torn them with their fingers until they were large enough to allow them to take a good-sized bite of apple. As they sat there, munching nuts and pop-corn, Kitty whispered, "We're like the man in the verse:
"'There was a young man so benighted, He never knew when he was slighted. He went to a party, And ate just as hearty As if he'd been really invited.'"
Katie tried hard not to laugh, but the effort ended in a snort, and she almost choked on a grain of pop-corn. If some one had not upset a jack-o'-lantern just then and started a wild scramble to put out the candle before it burned the cloth, the unbidden guests must certainly have been discovered.