“It was a damaged handkerchief. I got it for five cents, at a sale,” she explained. “It will make a jabot.”
“And you did this?” Olga asked.
Lizette nodded. “I know it isn’t good work, but if I had time I could learn——”
“Yes, you could—if you had the time and a few lessons. Are your eyes strong?”
The other nodded again. “Strong as they are ugly,” she flung out.
“Leave this with me for a day or two, will you, Lizette?”
“Uh-huh,” Lizette returned indifferently. “Give it to you, if you’ll take it.”
“Oh no—it’s too pretty. Lizette, you hate it so at Miss Rankin’s—why don’t you rent a room and get your own meals as I do?”
“Couldn’t. I’m so dead tired most nights that I’d rather go hungry than get my own supper. Some girls don’t seem to mind being on their feet from eight to six, but I can’t stand it. Sometimes I get so tired it seems as if I’d rather die than drag through another day of it! And besides—I don’t much like the other boarders at Rankin’s, but they’re better than nobody. To go back at night to an empty room and sit there till bedtime with not a soul to speak to—O, I couldn’t stand it. I’d get in a blue funk and end it all some night. I’m tempted to, as it is, sometimes.” She added, with a miserable laugh that was half a sob, “Nobody’d care,” and Olga heard her own voice saying earnestly,
“I’d care, Lizette. You must never, never think a thing like that again!”