Betty Leicester: A Story For Girls

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY Boston and New York
BOSTON AND NEW YORK HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY The Riverside Press Cambridge
COPYRIGHT, 1889, BY SARAH ORNE JEWETT COPYRIGHT, 1917, BY MARY R. JEWETT ALL RIGHTS RESERVED The Riverside Press CAMBRIDGE · MASSACHUSETTS PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.
WITH LOVE TO M. G. L. ONE OF THE FIRST OF BETTY'S FRIENDS

Two persons sat at a small breakfast-table near an open window, high up in Young's Hotel in Boston. It was a pleasant June morning, just after eight o'clock, and they could see the white clouds blowing over; but the gray walls of the Court House were just opposite, so that one cannot say much of their view of the world. The room was pleasanter than most hotel rooms, and the persons at breakfast were a girl of fifteen, named Betty Leicester, and her father. Their friends thought them both good-looking, but it ought to be revealed in this story just what sort of good looks they had, since character makes the expression of people's faces. But this we can say, to begin with: they had eyes very much alike, very kind and frank and pleasant, and they had a good fresh color, as if they spent much time out-of-doors. In fact, they were just off the sea, having come in only two days before on the Catalonia from Liverpool; and the Catalonia, though very comfortable, had made a slower voyage than some steamers do in coming across.
They had nearly finished breakfast, but Betty was buttering one more nice bit of toast to finish her marmalade, while Mr. Leicester helped himself to more strawberries. They both looked a little grave, as if something important were to be done when breakfast was over; and if you had sat in the third place by the table, and, instead of looking out of the window, had looked to right and left into the bedrooms that opened at either hand, you would guess the reason. In Betty's room, on her table, were ulster and her umbrella and her traveling-bag beside a basket, these last being labeled Miss E. Leicester, Tideshead; and in the room opposite was a corresponding array, excepting that the labels read, T. Leicester, Windsor Hotel, Montreal. So for once the girl and her father were going in different directions.