"Ach, now, don't be a baby," she admonished herself. "Go right up the stairs. You're a queen—no, I know!—You're a primer donner going up the platform steps to sing!"
With that helpful delusion she started bravely up the stairs and never paused until she reached the top step. She ran to a small window and threw it wide open so that the October sunshine could stream in and make the place less ghostly.
"Now it's fine up here," she cried. "And I dare—I may—talk to myself all I want. Aunt Maria says it's simple to talk to yourself, but goodness, when abody has no other boys or girls to talk to half the time like I don't, what else can abody do but talk to your own self? Anyhow, I'm up here now and dare talk out loud all I want. I'll hunt first for robbers."
She ran about the big attic, peered behind every old trunk and box, even inside an old yellow cupboard, though she knew it was filled with old school-books and older hymn-books.
"Not a robber here, less he's back under the eaves."
She crept into the low nook under the slanting roof but found nothing more exciting than a spider. "Huh, it's no fun hunting for robbers. Guess I'll spin a while."
With quick variability she drew a low stool near an old spinning-wheel, placed her foot on the slender treadle and twisted the golden flax in imitation of the way Aunt Maria had once taught her.
"I'll weave a new dress for myself—oh, goody!" she cried, springing from the stool. "Now I know what I'll do! I'll dress up in the old clothes in that old trunk! That'll be the very best party I can have."
She skipped to a far corner of the attic, where a long, leather-covered trunk stood among some boxes. In a moment the clasps were unfastened, the lid raised, a protecting cloth lifted from the top and the contents of the trunk exposed.
The child, kneeling before the trunk, clasped her hands and uttered an ecstatic, "Oh, I'll be a primer donner now! I remember there used to be a wonderful fine dress in here somewhere."