Letty was delighted. The basket was untied, and the yellow kitten appeared, somewhat ruffled by the journey, and very much amazed to find himself in a strange place. However, a saucer of milk and a bit of raw meat served to convince him that he had fallen into good hands; and he began at once to make himself at home in his new quarters.
"I have brought thee something else, which thou must divide with Agnes," said Aunt Eunice,—"a basket of eggs, and a pail of fresh butter, part of my last churning. And how is Agnes? Does she live near thee still?"
Letty pointed out the house, and said she would run over and call her; but Aunt Eunice stopped her.
"Let me rest a few minutes, and we will step over and see her. I should like to look in upon her unawares, as I have upon thee."
Letty consented,—rather unwillingly; for she knew what washing-days were to Agnes, and she thought it was hardly fair to take her at unawares. However, after a few minutes, spent in conversation or in silence, while Letty put away her share of the eggs and butter, Aunt Eunice was ready; and they crossed the road to Number Ten.
Agnes was certainly in no condition for visitors. In the course of her washing she had wetted herself from head to foot, and splashed the water from one end of the kitchen to the other. The breakfast-table had not been cleared away, but stood as used, with the remains of the morning's meal, and black with flies.
Agnes was attired in what had been her travelling-dress when she was first married,—a gray-and-purple valencia, which had once been very pretty, but was now torn, burned, frayed and worn in a manner really surprising. She never wore an apron about her work. Her hair was straggling about her ears, her shoes were down at the heels and out at the sides. A more forlorn figure it would be hard to imagine, especially in contrast with Letty in her neat pink calico and white apron and collar.
"Dear me, Aunt Eunice! Is this you? What cloud did you drop from? Do come in and sit down. I am all upside-down, washing, as you see; but you won't mind that, I am sure. You know poor people have to get on as they can. Do walk into the other room, out of this mess."
When Letty reached the other room, she could not think it such a great improvement over the kitchen. The furniture, bought in the fall to furnish the rooms at the boarding house, had already assumed the indescribably forlorn appearance which belongs to cheap neglected haircloth. Scratches appeared here and there, bits of veneering were knocked off, and each button was surrounded by its own little circle of dust. Dust had made a lodgment under the sofa, under the little corner-shelves filled with knickknacks, in which Agnes took especial pride,—on the skirting-boards and the window frames and ledges. Three or four highly-coloured French prints decorated the walls, and some gilt books, whose showy bindings and coarse paper were emblematic of their contents, lay on the table.
All this, however, was at first concealed by the judicious expedient of darkening the room till it was difficult to tell a table from a chair: so that Aunt Eunice had nearly sat down upon a shelf of the corner cupboard. It was a cardinal article of faith with Agnes that sunshine was vulgar and darkness genteel; but she so far relented as to turn the slats of the blinds, that her visitors might find their way to seats.