“We have had two cooks and two new second-girls since you went away,” Evelyn said, when they stood waiting for the front door to be opened, and the man with Maria's trunk stood behind them. “The last second-girl we had stole”—Evelyn said the last in a horrified whisper—“and the last cook couldn't cook. The cook we have now is named Agnes, and the second-girl is Irene. Agnes lets me go out in the kitchen and make candy, and she always makes a little cake for me; but I don't like Irene. She says things under her breath when she thinks nobody will hear, and she makes up my bed so it is all wrinkly. I shouldn't be surprised if she stole, too.”
Then the door opened and a white-capped maid, with a rather pretty face, evidently of the same class as Gladys Mann, appeared.
“This is my sister, Miss Maria, Irene,” said Evelyn.
The maid nodded and said something inarticulate.
Maria said “How do you do?” to her, and asked her to tell the man where to carry the trunk.
When the trunk was in Maria's old room, and Maria had smoothed her hair and washed her face and hands, she and Evelyn sat down in the parlor and waited. The parlor looked to Maria, after poor Aunt Maria's sparse old furnishings, more luxurious than she had remembered it. In fact, it had been improved. There were some splendid palms in the bay-window, and some new articles of furniture. The windows, also, had been enlarged, and were hung with new curtains of filmy lace, with thin, red silk over them. The whole room seemed full of rosy light.
“I wish you would ask Irene to fix the hearth fire,” Evelyn had said to Maria when they entered the room, which did seem somewhat chilly.
Maria asked the girl to do so, and when she had gone and the fire was blazing Evelyn said:
“I didn't like to ask her, sister. She doesn't realize that I am not a baby, and she does not like it. So I never ask her to do anything except when mamma is here. Irene is afraid of mamma.”
Maria laughed and looked at the clock. “How long will it be before father comes, do you think, dear?” she asked.