Yet though Brenda made a good impression on Mrs. McSorley, the latter would not commit herself to say just what she would have Maggie do if she should lose her place. She'd set her mind on having the girl rise through the different grades. "I hate to have to switch my mind round—I'm that set," she had explained, adding, "Maggie thinks me stingy because I take all her earnings instead of letting her spend money for fine feathers and theatres like the rest of the girls hereabouts. But some time she'll be grateful." Then came Brenda's opportunity for saying a little about her plan for Maggie,—a plan so quickly made, so likely to be set aside by the grim aunt.
While Mrs. McSorley listened she moved around the room, filling the tea-kettle, lighting the lamp. At last, when Brenda had finished, her reply gave only a slight hope that she would agree to the plan. Yet Brenda felt that she had gained a point when Mrs. McSorley promised to go with Maggie in a few days to visit the school.
The lighted lamp reminded Brenda that outside it must be dusk. It would trouble her to find her way to the cars through unfamiliar streets, and she was only too glad to accept Maggie's offer to guide her, and Maggie was more than delighted to have this last chance for a little talk with "the kind young lady."
"You'll not cry," said Brenda, "even if they won't take you back; remember that you have a new friend."
"Oh, Miss, you're so good, and to think that you have nothing for your twenty dollars but those pieces of broken glass."
"Ah! it's very pretty glass," responded Brenda, "and I'm going to keep the pieces as a reminder."
What she meant was that she would keep the pieces as a reminder not to be extravagant, and as she looked at the little silver mesh purse hanging at her belt she smiled to think that since she left home in the early afternoon it had been emptied of more than twenty dollars, while she had nothing to show for the money,—nothing, indeed, except her new acquaintance with Mrs. McSorley and Maggie, and some fragments of glass.