Mrs. Renford was still sitting up in bed, propped up by pillows, a crimson shawl arranged around her shoulders over her night-dress. She was a very pretty, dark-haired, dark-eyed woman, with small, delicate features, and there was a bright, deceptive flush on her thin cheeks as she conversed with her little daughter. Felicia thought how much better her mother was looking to-night, and her spirits rose as she reassured herself with the thought that she had taken a turn for the better, and would soon be well again.
After the little girl had washed the supper things and tidied the room—the floor around the spot where she had been seated at work all day had been strewn with ends of cotton and scraps of print—she went to the window, which was wide open to admit as much air as possible, and looked out. The moon, like a golden globe, was high in the heavens, and illuminated the roofs and chimney pots which, with a glimpse of the sluggish river, comprised the view.
"It is a beautiful night," Felicia informed her mother as she raised her tired eyes to the cloudless sky; "the air is so fresh, and the river is shining like silver—who would think it is actually so dirty? Oh, mother dear, you must make haste and get strong enough to go out-of-doors, for one forgets it is summer, shut up here!"
[CHAPTER II]
Mrs. M'Cosh Goes Upstairs
"I AM afraid that poor woman up in the attic is in a bad state," remarked Mrs. M'Cosh to her husband half-an-hour after she had so summarily dismissed Felicia; "I've not seen her for weeks, but the last time I met her on the stairs I was struck by her appearance, she looked as though a breath of wind would have blown her away, and now she's laid up altogether."
"Dear me, dear me," responded Mr. M'Cosh, "that's sad—very."
Husband and wife were seated at the supper table. The former had thoroughly enjoyed his meal, and was now dawdling over the drinking of his second cup of tea. He was a small, wiry man—a mason by trade—with a mild, clean-shaven face, thin, iron-gray hair, and a pair of light blue eyes. Mrs. M'Cosh usually addressed him as "Master," and he always spoke of her as "the missus," but it was the general impression of outsiders that Mrs. M'Cosh was master and mistress too. However that may have been, they were a united couple, for James M'Cosh was a steady, hard-working man, and his wife was a thrifty, industrious woman who made their home—the second storey of the house—a comfortable and happy one.
"Yes, it's very sad," agreed Mrs. M'Cosh. She sat in silence for a few minutes, her brow knitted in a frown. "They seem lonely folks," she went on by-and-by, "without a friend in the place. Felicia—why couldn't her mother have called her plain Mary, or Susan, or Jane, or some sensible name?—was here to beg some boiling water just now, and she looked fit to drop. I expect she'd been at the sewing machine all day."
"Poor child!" said Mr. M'Cosh; "such a bright-looking, pretty little girl she is, too, to be kept shut up in that attic all day long! It's very hard for her."