All four of the girls had leanings toward a life of luxury and ease,
and when Mrs. March smilingly proposed that they
try a whole week of
"all play and no work," they agreed eagerly. But the experiment was a
miserable failure; and after mortifying scenes at a company luncheon, a
canary-bird dead from negleet, several slight illnesses and lost
tempers, the girls decided that lounging and larking didn't pay.
Now John Brooke, the tutor of Laurie, was a secret admirer of
pretty Meg. Discovering this, the mischievous boy wrote Meg a
passionate love-letter, purporting to be from Brooke. This prank caused
a terrible upset in both houses, but later on Brooke put the momentous
question, and Meg meekly whispered, "Yes, John," and hid her face on
his waistcoat. Jo, blundering in, was transfixed with astonishment and
dismay, and ex-claimed, "Oh, do somebody come quick! John Brooke is
acting dreadfully, and Meg likes it!"
At
Christmas, Father March came home from the war, and great
celebration was made. The neighbors from the Laurence house were
invited, and there never was such a Christmas dinner as they had that
day!
Later came the first break in their restored home circle. The
Dovecote was the name of the little brown house that John Brooke had
prepared for his bride, and it was a tiny affair with a lawn in front
about as big as a pocket handkerchief ! The wedding, beneath the June
roses, was a simple, homey one, and the bridal journey was only the
walk from the March home to the dear little new house. "I'm too happy
to care what any one says-I'm going to have my wedding just as I want
it!" Meg had declared; and so, leaning on her husband's arm, her hands
full of flowers, she went away, saying: "Thank you all for my happy
wedding-day. Good-by, good-by!"