“Don’t they tell the truth?” and Angelina looked utterly surprised. “I always believe every word I read.”
“You have a great deal to learn, Angelina, and I do hope that you will remember what I have said about patent medicines.”
One Wednesday, a week or two later, Julia found Angelina standing before the mirror in the little room with a bottle in her hand.
“What are you doing?” she asked, suspecting the truth, and Angelina, starting guiltily, dropped the bottle, and a pinkish fluid poured out on the light carpet. As the bottle lay there, Julia read the words “Pearl of Beauty” on the outside. Angelina shamefacedly seized a towel and began to mop up the carpet, murmuring as she did so, “I bought it with my own money.”
Realizing that she had little authority over Angelina, Julia could only say, “I am sorry that you have so little regard for my opinion.” Yet neither then nor at any other time did Angelina apologize for what she had done. When Julia, consequently, reflected on the matter, she wondered if, after all, she might not have made a mistake in showing so much confidence in Angelina.
XVI
WHO WROTE IT?
“It’s bad taste, anyway,” said Annabel Harmon.
“To call it by no worse name,” responded Elizabeth Darcy.
“Almost nothing can be worse than bad taste,” rejoined Annabel.
The two girls, at a table in the conversation room, were looking eagerly at the page of a newspaper.