“You see, Bab,” Mollie said, trying to stuff her curls under her motor cap and to rub the dust from her rosy cheeks with a tiny pocket handkerchief as they sped up Broadway, “I might be dreadfully embarrassed arriving at the Waldorf looking the way I do, if I were not in a motor car, but riding in an automobile makes one feel so awfully swell that nothing matters. Isn’t it lovely just to feel important for once? You know it is, Bab, and you needn’t say no! It’s silly to pretend.”
Miss Sallie was again on the border of slumberland, so that Mollie and Barbara could have their low-voiced talk.
“Does Ruth know I have never even been to New York before?” asked Mollie. “I hope I won’t seem very green about things. You must tell me if I do, Bab.”
But Bab only laughed and shook her head. “You are a foolish baby,” she said.
Two respectful porters at the Waldorf helped a dusty, crumpled party out of the big red touring car.
The girls, a little dazed, followed Miss Sallie through a maze of palms and servants in livery, with handsomely dressed people strolling through the halls, until their suite of rooms, which Mr. Stuart had engaged by telegraph a few days before, was reached.
The three rooms adjoined, only separated by white tile bathrooms. Miss Sallie, naturally, had a room to herself, and it was decided that Ruth and Grace were to sleep together, leaving the sisters to themselves.
“Isn’t it too beautiful!” sighed Mollie, standing in the midst of their luxurious chamber, gazing around at the single brass beds, with their rose-colored draperies, and the ivory-striped satin wall paper, garlanded in pink flowers. Ruth and Grace were equally fine in a room decorated in blue, and, even in the Waldorf, Miss Sallie’s taste seemed to have been consulted, as her room was in her favorite violet shade.
In some mysterious way the crumpled muslin dresses were taken downstairs by a maid, and came back smooth and fresh. Even Miss Sallie’s elaborate chiffon gown looked as though it had just come home from the modiste’s.
“O Ruth! Ruth!” Mollie exclaimed, as the four girls made their way to the dining-room, Miss Sallie in the lead, “I didn’t know there could be such a magnificent place in the world as this. I don’t know what I can ever do to repay you, except to love you and be grateful my whole life long.”