The evening passed merrily by, and when it was bedtime, Bumble showed Patty to her room.
When Patty found that a large front room on the second floor had been allotted to her, she expressed a fear lest she might be inconveniencing some one else by taking one of the choice rooms of the house.
"Not a bit," said Bumble. "Nan has the tower-room, because she likes it better, and the house is so big, there are plenty of rooms, anyway. Of course, if a lot of company comes, we may ask you to give up this, and take a smaller room, but you wouldn't mind that, would you?"
"No, indeed," said Patty. "I'll move out at any time." Then Bumble kissed her cousin good-night and went away.
Patty's trunk had been placed in her room, and she found that some one had kindly unfastened its straps and clasps, so she had only to unlock it. She unpacked her clothes, and hung up her dresses in the wardrobe and cupboard, and put things neatly away in the bureau-drawers.
She placed her mother's picture on a small table, and looking at it critically, she concluded that it was like Aunt Grace, but much prettier.
After this, Patty looked round the great room with much interest. It seemed to contain a perfect hodge-podge of furniture. There were three dressing-bureaus, and a huge wash-stand with two bowls and pitchers on it. There were several large easy chairs, and an old haircloth sofa; there were small tables, and bookcases, and a cabinet filled with bric-a-brac, but,—and Patty could scarcely believe her eyes,—there was no bed!
When this fact dawned upon her, she concluded that one of the bookcases or bureaus must be a folding-bed.
She tried to open them, but the bureau-drawers and the bookcase-shelves proved themselves to be really what they seemed; then she looked for a bed concealed in an alcove or an anteroom, but the curtains hid only windows and the doors opened into ordinary closets.
Patty even looked in the fireplace and up the chimney, but she was gradually forced to the conclusion that there was no bed at her disposal, and that she must either report this fact to some member of the family or sit up all night.