"Ah! That is something like," said Mrs. Paget as she looked over the box which Amity brought her. "If you can do as much for us every week, it will be a very great help. Did you find a roll of aprons in the basket? I have mislaid one somewhere."
"Yes, ma'am," answered Amity: "I will go and bring it down."
"How very neatly the child has done them! Do you see, Julia?" said Mrs. Paget.
"I dare say she has. She seems a persevering little body. I think it will be a very good thing if she takes a fancy to that kind of work, as she has really no talent for anything else."
"A talent for being useful is about as good a talent as any one can have in this world," said Mrs. Paget, "and perhaps in the other also. There seems, at least, some ground for thinking so."
Miss Julia only smiled. She was used to such remarks from her friend, and did not mind them in the least.
"Papa," said Miss Julia at dinner, a fortnight afterward, "Mrs. Roby called here this morning. She has taken a cottage at Long Branch, and wishes us to come down and spend a month with them. Have you any objection?"
"None in the least to your going, if you like it," answered Judge Bogardus. "As for me, I have another engagement, and with a young lady too: so that my going is out of the question, even if I wished it—which I don't."
"What engagement can you possibly have with a young lady?" asked Miss Julia, in surprise.
"I have engaged to take Miss Amity Bogardus to the mountains. We spoke first of the Catskills; but, if it is all the same to her, I think we will go to the White Mountains instead—eh, miss?"