Susie was delighted, and Elfie looked pleased. "You'll be sure to get on now," she said complacently.
"Do you clean all these steps?" asked Susie, looking down the neat quiet street.
Elfie laughed. "I don't clean steps now, I tell you," she said, rather sharply.
"Why not?" asked Susie; "Do you get so many baskets to mind now?" she asked.
"I don't mind baskets either," said Elfie fiercely. "I'm just street rubbish—just what people said I was long ago; and I don't care a bit. No, I don't care; and I won't care," she added, "though you do talk about that school, and try to coax me to go with you."
Susie looked at her angry face in silent surprise. What could have provoked this outbreak she could not tell, for she had not ventured to mention the Ragged School to her for some weeks past, although she had not given up all hope of persuading her to go with her.
"Elfie, what's the matter—what do you mean?" she asked.
Elfie looked somewhat subdued. "Why, you're not to bother me about what I do to get the money," she said, rather more quietly. "I cleaned steps as long as I could, but I never had anybody to teach me to do things like you had; and then the people in the market called me a thief, and I couldn't get the baskets to mind."
"Never mind, Elfie; I know you ain't a thief, and I love you," said Susie, in a gentle, soothing voice.
But Elfie shrunk away from the proffered caress. "I'm bad, I tell you, and don't want you to love me."