Miss Jenks did mind; she was nervous and almost frightened, but she stuck to her task. Judith bent lower over the machine, knitting her brow as she studied its working. The regular movement of the carriage, the flashing type-arms, the flying fingers, and the result in violet print, took strong hold of her.
"There," said Miss Jenks at last, flushing deeply, "the letter is ready for Mr. Mather's signature." She drew it from the machine and handed it to Judith.
"Is it so very hard?" asked Judith, glancing at the letter for but a moment, then fixing the stenographer with an earnest eye. "Did you have to study long?"
"At the typewriting?" asked Miss Jenks. "No, I picked that up quickly. But shorthand is not easy at all." She took from the desk a note-book and offered it to Judith. "Those are my notes of what Mr. Mather dictated."
The pothooks on the paper meant nothing to Judith, but she saw that they were very few. "Is this whole letter in these signs?" she asked. "Indeed! It must be hard to learn." She looked still harder at the stenographer, who blushed again under the intense scrutiny. Judith was thinking that if this little, anæmic girl could learn shorthand, surely she could do so herself.
"But Judith," said Beth, interposing, "you are keeping her from her work."
"The letters are all finished," murmured Miss Jenks, glad to turn her embarrassed eyes elsewhere.
Judith moved to the typewriter and looked down at it. Until this morning she had never seen one except in an advertisement; its shiny complications grew more attractive. She said nothing, but Beth smiled at Mather mischievously.
"Try it," she suggested to Judith.
"Oh, if you will!" exclaimed Miss Jenks. She slipped a sheet of paper into place and placed the chair for Judith. "Will you not?" she invited. Judith took the seat.