She bowed to the reflection in the mirror—the sunburnt, rough-haired, little brown girl in Peggy Janes and venerable sneakers. Then she opened the door and peeped into the closet. Why, here were some of her dresses, of net, and organdie, and gingham, her riding clothes, her boots. She chuckled to herself. What faces Hannah and Sallie would wear, if she should put on her clothes—her own clothes!—and go down the stairs, and appear before them. Well, very soon she would!
But before that day came—oh, what might not happen! All her troubles thronged back upon her, and to think that she must suffer so much, for what always before in her life she had thought a little sum of money! If only she had now one of the five-dollar bills that she had often wasted! If she could open her little vanity bag, and find in it some money—her own money!
Fascinated with the thought, she stepped into the closet, and looked to see if one of her little bags were perhaps hanging from the hooks. Of course not! She might have known that fussy little Caroline would put them carefully into a drawer, as she herself had always been told to do. She came out of the closet, and softly closed the door, and hurried to the bureau. Without scruple—for weren’t these things all her own, and the room meant for her?—she opened the drawers and hastily peeped in. She found only one of her bags, the gray one with beads, and it was quite empty.
Disappointed, she closed the drawer, and with a sigh turned away. Once more she saw her reflection in the mirror of the dressing-table, and hesitatingly she drew near. She hadn’t been able half to see herself in the wavering looking glass at the farm. My, but she had put on a great coat of tan this summer!
From the reflection in the mirror, her eyes dropped to the pretties on the dressing-table. Little boxes and toys of Dresden china—delicate, dainty things. She touched them lightly—as Sallie had told her not to do. Sallie, indeed! She guessed she had the right. She lifted the cover of the little trinket box that she was fingering, and there, coiled in its white depths, a chain of gold beads—her own gold beads—twinkled up at her.
CHAPTER XXXIV
A BUSINESS TRANSACTION
At five minutes after four Jacqueline appeared in the kitchen. In her hand she carried the tin housemaid’s assistant, with its soap and powder, rags and nickel polish.
“I’ve finished,” she announced briefly.
Hannah looked down from the step-ladder, where she was standing to clean the cupboard shelves. Sallie poked her head out from the butler’s pantry, where she seemed totally surrounded with hot soap-suds and china dishes.
“I bet you give ’em a lick and a promise,” she said morosely. “I’m going up and see for myself.”