From the 'den' it could all be seen. There were two girls on the small porch, each washing a window. The elder girl looked as if she were about eighteen, her abundant curly hair, of a decided reddish brown, being worn low at her neck after the fashion of girls of that age. Even across the street the observers could see that she had a merry face, full of life and colour.
The younger girl, was about Shirley's size, round-faced and sturdy, and apparently of an amiable frame of mind, for having accidentally tipped over her pail, she took the mishap in the jolliest spirit, and throwing back her thick brown braids of hair, mopped up the swimming porch with lively flourishes.
"I wish we could see 'em closer," suggested Shirley. "They look so nice--don't you think they do?--not a bit like the other people that have lived in that house. I saw their mother, I 'm sure I did, a little while ago--she had the dearest face! Murray, don't you think you 'd like to take a little walk? It would be such fun to go past the house while they 're out there, and they 'd be sure to turn and look, so we could see their faces. Please, Murray! We may not have so good a chance after they get the windows washed."
It was something to do, certainly. Motives of interest for the daily walk upon which the doctors insisted were few, and the older brother gladly followed his anxious young leader out into the spring sunshine. Slowly, Murray's cane tapping their advance, they turned the corner from Worthington Square into Gay Street.
Coming rapidly toward them from the opposite direction was a young fellow of about Murray's age. This youth, looking toward the brown house, gave a low whistle. The girls upon the porch turned and waved their cloths, and the newcomer, making three leaps of the short path to the house, and one jump of the low porch, was with them.
They did not shout, those three, and the elder girl's voice, Murray noted, was delightfully modulated; but he and Shirley were close now, and they could not help hearing the greeting.
"Hard at it already? Everything come? I got off for an hour, and thought I 'd rush up and do what I could."
"That was lovely of you, Pete," said the elder girl. A surreptitious glance from Murray, and a frank stare from Shirley, proved her to possess a very attractive face, indeed, as she smiled at the stoutly built young man before her. "Yes, everything has come, and mother can keep you busy every minute. Window-washing would n't seem to come first, but we thought we 'd get at least this little front room in order by night, so that when you all came home----"
Her voice was growing indistinct as the passers-by moved reluctantly on. But the younger girl at this point broke in, and her voice, high and eager like Shirley's own, carried farther:
"O Petey, Jane and I are to have the dearest, littlest room you ever saw, right under the eaves. Jane can't stand up all over, but I can--except close to the wall. It's so little, Jane thinks we can paper it ourselves. If we can only----"