CHAPTER IV
The Birthday
Elizabeth sat in her little blue room, and shivered.
It was the afternoon of her birthday, and although she hadn't mentioned the fact to any one, she had dressed herself to do honour to the occasion. Every undergarment, chemise, camisole, and petticoat, was of a soft, flesh-tinted silk. Her dress was of the finest white muslin trimmed only with infinitesimal tucks and Valenciennes beading, and she was wearing a blue ribbon sash with a big butterfly bow at the back.
"My pride ought to keep me warm," she thought, "what a pity it doesn't."
Before she bought her silken lingerie she had deliberated a long time between that magnificence and a light blue wool sweater and had finally succumbed to the lure of the lacy garments which had taken every penny of her month's allowance and all that she was allowed to borrow on her next.
She looked around her room with a glow of satisfaction, having only that morning put the finishing touches on it. She had draped the windows with an old-fashioned print, a blue groundwork with tiny pink roses wandering over it, that her grandmother had produced from an ancient chest stored with remnants of the popular fabrics of an older generation. The furniture she had chosen was mostly painted black, or a very dark stain. She had found another flag-bottomed chair, a twin to the first, and a wonderful old settee on rockers, which had a deep seat with an adjustable rack running along the outside of it, as if to prevent its being used except for the one person who chose to sit in the space that was clear at the end. This she had piled with cushions made from little square pillows that her grandmother kept for "children who came a-visiting." Her desk and her spinning wheel were in opposite comers, and a miniature organ, the keyboard of which comprised two octaves exactly, occupied a position under the eaves between the two farther windows.
The morning mail had brought her a writing-case from her mother, a check for five dollars from her father, and a letter, her first, from her Buddy. She had taken a high resolution not to shed one tear on her birthday, and the mild faces of Faith and Charity smiled down on her as if to strengthen her will.
"Hope looks a little teary, herself," she said.