Looking once at a picture of the "Merry Wives of Windsor"—a blowsy, frowsy, dreadfully decolleté couple—Dorothy had deprecatingly exclaimed: "Oh, Syb, dear! You won't ever have to look like that, will you, if you become an actress?"
"Good heavens, no! Don't be such a goose, Dorrie! Can't you see these are not actresses at all? They are just imaginary pictures of Mrs. Ford and Mrs. Page, drawn by some stupid, coarse-minded man!"
And Dorrie, properly snubbed, went back to "Molly Bawn," and left Sybil to rumple her hair and grow very red-cheeked over her study of Juliet—for where is the stage-struck girl who begins with any lesser character? Then, while they brushed their hair and plaited it à la Chinoise for the night, Sybil laid before her sister some wildly impossible plan for making the immediate acquaintance of Claire Morrell, and Dorothy listened to her continual harping on that one string with a gentle patience that was wonderful in one so young. But Dorrie had a firm faith in God's promise to His people—His people being, in her eyes, those who loved Him; and from that faith came the patience that was her strength, and that often supported older members of the family through trying hours.
All being in readiness, it did not take long for the girls to dress for breakfast and for an early start cityward. So, carrying down their hats and gloves and the sunshade they had borrowed over night from Mrs. Lawton, they came laughing into the dining-room, to find that lady trussed up in her street gown, instead of the usual breakfast jacket, and heard her sharply announce: "I, too, am going to the city this morning!"
"W—why, mamma!" faltered both girls, and then Dorothy turned her blue eyes away, that the rising tears might not be seen.
"But—but I thought everything was all settled last night?" quavered Sybil.
"I can't help last night!" snapped Mrs. Lawton. "This is to-day, and I've got to go down town. Time was when I had not to account for every movement to my own children—when my husband would have risen in his place and forbidden such a humiliating action——"
Now to be just, one must admit that, though very garrulous, Letitia Lawton was not an ill-tempered woman, and this unusual sharpness of tone and word brought utter amazement into the eyes of her daughters. John Lawton's slippered feet shifted uneasily beneath the table: "I'm afraid your coffee will grow cold, my dear!" he murmured.
Sybil ventured to suggest that the shopping list, though long, was simple enough for a child to manage successfully, and just then both girls became aware of something unusual in their mother's appearance—of a sort of toning down—a—a lessening of color—a—not a pallor exactly, but a—why? As they turned troubled, bewildered eyes toward each other, Lena, who always left them to wait upon themselves at breakfast, while she played femme de chambre upstairs, came stumbling down, volubly defending herself in advance from some unspoken charge and holding something in her closed wet hand: "I no have done dot ting! no, I neffer make mit dot ting! No, neffer! My Miss Ladies! Vunce—youst vunce—I touch dot cork to de tongue—youst dot I see if it vas beet juice alretty, und it vasn't—und I ain't broke nottings! No, my Herr Mister—nottings!"
"In other days," groaned Mrs. Lawton, "this girl would only have known my scullery!"