"It's awfully kind of you to help me," she even dared to say.
"I'll be glad to help you." Miss Morley smiled, too. "I never dressed a queen before, and it will be great fun. We'll begin at the very beginning because I expect that your underthings are no more royal than your outside clothes."
"I've always wanted silk things," apologized Tessie, her hands fluttering among the soft flesh-colored crepes and satins. She loved them. She wanted them all. She longed to feel the touch of them on her slim little body which had known only coarse cotton.
But Miss Morley pushed the lovely things contemptuously away. She even tilted her long aristocratic nose at them.
"They're all right for silly shopgirls and cheap persons," she declared scornfully, "but what a queen wants—oh, Rose, haven't you any linen, fine and sheer, hand-sewed and hand-hem-stitched?"
And when Miss Rose Beacon of the lingerie had produced a special box in which was linen, soft and fine, and enriched with much dainty hand-work, she drew a long breath.
"There!" She pushed the cobwebby things towards Tessie. "That's what queens wear!" She said it as positively as if she had dressed a queen every day of her life.
"But—" faltered Tessie, looking longingly at the flesh-colored satins and crepes.
"Half a dozen sets of these, Rose," ordered Miss Morley. "And as many gowns."
"And half a dozen sets of the satin, too," whispered Tessie, the minute Miss Morley turned her back. "I've always wanted silk underclothes, and now I'm going to have some even if all queens don't wear them. I guess I can afford them!"