“That wouldn’t affect the fact, and nobody will laugh at you for respecting yourself. Only you must lookout that you don’t think so much of yourself that you neglect your duty. People would have a right to laugh at you then. Now I’m going for the rose;” and having seen that Jenie’s belongings were in order, she opened the door and started for the lower hall, humming a gay chansonette and emphasizing its tune with a step as graceful as if art, not nature, had prompted it. Herbert Lynn’s door stood open, and unseen by Elsie, he watched the lively patter of a pair of bronze slippers along the hall with a light that was somewhat deeper than amusement in his eyes.
“Good-evening!” he exclaimed as Elsie neared his door. “These buttons on my glove are a trifle refractory. May I beg you to fasten them?”
The song on her lips met instant suppression as she glanced up with heightened color into the blue eyes that were smiling down at her. It seemed to Elsie that it was rare good fortune which sent James at that moment across the hall.
“James,” she called, “Mr. Lynn would like to have you button his glove,” and without pausing a second Elsie walked soberly along the hall to Mrs. Mason’s room. Herbert bit his lips in vexation, and re-entering his room, he slammed the door in no very amiable frame of mind.
“The witch!” he exclaimed, throwing himself into a chair and scowling like a thunder-cloud. “How cavalierly she does treat me! Jove! isn’t she lovely in that cheap finery! She ought to ‘walk in silk attire and siller hae to spare’ instead of being doomed to the round of Helen’s pots and pans. How unequally the good things of life seem to be distributed, and how singular it is to find such pride of character in a girl occupying her position in life. Well, I’d give ‘Jupiter and his power to thunder’ to break that stubborn pride of hers, and I’ll do it or die in the attempt.”
A look of resolute will settled over the bright, almost boyish, face and gave it an added strength and beauty, which struck Elsie wonderingly as a moment later she encountered him in the hall with her hands full of roses. He bestowed upon her only the slightest nod as he passed rapidly down the stairs, and Elsie climbed to her room and pinned the roses at throat and belt with a feeling that something had taken the glamor from the evening’s enjoyment.
“I don’t care,” said she defiantly. “I knew my hands would tremble if I tried to fasten those buttons; besides, I don’t thank him for noticing me in the least. I’m only ‘Elsie the cook’ and he knows it, for all of his pleadings to the contrary. I just want him to let me alone, and there’s all there is of it.”
This stalwart enunciation of wishes was not wholly borne out by the misty eyes that greeted her from the glass, and it required several little pattings of her handkerchief to clear them so that she dare trust herself in the waiting-room below. The guests were already arriving as Elsie entered the dressing-rooms, and her services were at once called into requisition in undoing trains, buttoning gloves and slippers, making up faces and arms, and arranging dishevelled coiffures. More than one quick glance was bestowed by the guests upon the pretty maid in pink who so deftly ministered to their various needs, and one tall, statuesque girl of superb grace and unusual elegance of costume attempted to slip a dollar into Elsie’s hands as she was about to leave the room.
“I beg your pardon,” said Elsie, flushing. “I—I cannot accept the money. Mrs. Mason pays me for my work.”
The lady laughed as she tapped Elsie’s cheek with her fan. “You must be a new acquisition of Helen’s. I do not remember to have seen you before, and as for the money, my dear child, I always bestow it upon those who serve and please me.”