Belles on their Toes

carry it out to the butler's pantry to wash and dry it, while the maid was finishing her meal in the kitchen. When the child would go to put his fork down, there wouldn't be any place to put it except the table cloth, so he'd have to hold it in his hand until Mother came back.
    "The maid may want to go to a movie or something," Mother would explain, while she collected the silverware. Between the colored woman and Mother, the children were relieved of all the chores that the rest of us had had to do in the past.
    Now that there were no young children in the house, there was no need for a system under which each child was responsible for a younger one, or for the process charts in the bathrooms. The German and French language records had worn out or been broken, and Mother never replaced them.
    When the married members of the family dropped in to visit, they didn't hesitate to tell Mother that they never had had things that easy when they were growing up, and that the three youngest ones were being spoiled.
    But Mother, bouncing a grandchild on her knee and playing peekaboo, would reply that she wasn't sure this little fellow was being raised just right, either. He had on too many clothes, for one thing, and she didn't think she liked his color. Those new formulas might be all right, but...
    We knew it was an act, because Mother herself always laughed at meddling grandmothers, and she really believed that the new formulas were resulting in bigger, stronger babies. But she managed to get across her point.
    We began to suspect, while watching how Mother was raising her three youngest, that she never had entirely approved of many of Dad's systems of regimentation. Some of them had been necessary because the family was so large. Perhaps she had allowed the others to remain in effect, until they stopped of their own accord, because she didn't want to overrule Dad.
    Mother seemed, if possible, to grow closer than ever to her three youngest children. But we thought the house must seem empty of children to her. She was bound to realize that Jane would be away at college in a little more than three years, and that after that there would be no one left at home.
    We wondered what she'd do in the big, drafty house that held so many memories. She couldn't stay there by herself, of course. Yet we felt sure she'd never be willing to sell it. And she had said repeatedly that she wouldn't live in anyone else's home—even the home of one of her children.
    Frankly, we were worried about Mother.

    The four youngest boys wanted to be sure Jane would be a social success when she entered high school. The last of the Gilbreths, they thought, should set a record for popularity that would stand at least until the grandchildren came along.
    The bobby sox era was making its debut, after a decade of formal afternoon dresses, spike-heels and kinky permanent waves. The hep-cat and the square were about to take their places at opposite ends of the terpsichorean scale, and it was possible to cut a rug without having either carpet or scissors.
    The boys wanted to be sure that Jane was among the first on the bandwagon.
    In many respects, Jane was Martha all over again. She was tall for her age, didn't realize she had developed a figure, and was content to wear Lillian's hand-me-down dresses and shoes. Also she had a habit of flopping untidily into chairs and spreading her knees as wide as a chestnut tree.
    But she was beginning to be interested in boys, and she listened willingly to the suggestions of Fred, Dan, Jack and Bob.
    Fred and Dan, who as college men spoke with some authority, were the first to start grooming Jane for high school. During the summer, they began telling her what sort of clothes she should buy for her fall wardrobe.
    "Those things you wear are all out of date," Fred said. "Only sad apples wear them any more. You want to get saddle shoes, sweaters and skirts, and those socks that just come to your ankles."
    "I'm not going to dress like a little girl," Jane complained. "I can dress up more than that when I go to high school, can't I, Mother?"
    "The boys usually know what they're talking about," Mother said doubtfully.
    "Lillian has a silk dress she said I can have, and I thought I'd get some others like that," Jane pouted.
    "You listen to what we're telling you," Dan ordered. "Those silk dresses are out. The college girls are wearing what Fred says, and you want to be one of the first in high school to dress that way."
    "The first