Can I do it ? '' asked Beth , a few weeks after that eventful call of his . `` Yes , dear . It will please him very much , and be a nice way of thanking him . The girls will help you about them , and I will pay for the making up , '' replied Mrs. March , who took peculiar pleasure in granting Beth 's requests because she so seldom asked anything for herself . After many serious discussions with Meg and Jo , the pattern was chosen , the materials bought , and the slippers begun . A cluster of grave yet cheerful pansies on a deeper purple ground was pronounced very appropriate and pretty , and Beth worked away early and late , with occasional lifts over hard parts . She was a nimble little needlewoman , and they were finished before anyone got tired of them . Then she wrote a short , simple note , and with Laurie 's help , got them smuggled onto the study table one morning before the old gentleman was up . When this excitement was over , Beth waited to see what would happen . All day passed and a part of the next before any acknowledgement arrived , and she was beginning to fear she had offended her crochety friend . On the afternoon of the second day , she went out to do an errand , and give poor Joanna , the invalid doll , her daily exercise . As she came up the street , on her return , she saw three , yes , four heads popping in and out of the parlor windows , and the moment they saw her , several hands were waved , and several joyful voices screamed ... `` Here 's a letter from the old gentleman ! Come quick , and read it ! '' `` Oh , Beth , he 's sent you ... '' began Amy , gesticulating with unseemly energy , but she got no further , for Jo quenched her by slamming down the window . Beth hurried on in a flutter of suspense . At the door her sisters seized and bore her to the parlor in a triumphal procession , all pointing and all saying at once , `` Look there ! Look there ! '' Beth did look , and turned pale with delight and surprise , for there stood a little cabinet piano , with a letter lying on the glossy lid , directed like a sign board to `` Miss Elizabeth March . '' `` For me ? ''
gasped Beth , holding onto XXXXX and feeling as if she should tumble down , it was such an overwhelming thing altogether .
Beth Elizabeth Jo Joanna Laurie Meg before daily needlewoman weeks