But something kept her, and for three days Polly waited upon her table, while she worked on the costumes, in which she became a good deal interested, especially the brocade which Amy was to wear, and which was made to fit her perfectly, thanks to Sherry’s deft fingers and taste. She had cut out a piece here and added a gore there, and made the waist lower so as to show Amy’s fine neck, and with every swish of her scissors she had felt she was inflicting bodily pain upon the great-grandmother she had never seen or scarcely heard of until recently. When the dress was done, Amy, who was about her size and figure, had asked her to put it on, that she might see how it looked and if there were any changes to be made. And Sherry put it on, and stood as a model while Mrs. Marsh and the young ladies and Alex. and Charley Reeves were called in to see what a beautiful dress it was.
“By George!” was all Alex. said, and then walked out.
He did not think it just the thing for Amy to make a model of Sherry to be gazed at, and when Charley Reeves said to him, “I say, Marsh, No. 1 is a stunner,” he felt for a moment as if he hated Charley for speaking thus of Sherry. What business had he to call her a stunner or speak of her as No. 1? He never did. He always called her Fanny and had a growing conviction that she was out of place as a waitress. When he could get time he’d find out somehow. Just now he was too busy with his preparations for the ball, which was to excel anything ever seen in the neighborhood. He had heard from Bowles, who had it from his grandfather, of the great Crosby party, talked of so long by the people. Just what they did at that party neither he nor Bowles knew.
“It was up to snuff,” Bowles said; “with grandees from all over, and dancing till four in the morning, and some of the grandees rather noisy with too much wine.”
Alex. did not mean to have anything of that sort. Otherwise everything should be first class; and he was busy everywhere and tired to death, he said, when the day came for what he called his “blow out.”
“You will have to help me dress,” Amy said to Sherry on the day of the party, and after dinner, which was served earlier than usual, Sherry found herself acting in the capacity of maid to Amy, whose hair she arranged and whose dress she put on, adjusting a ribbon here and a knot of lace there, fastening a brooch of pearls and rubies at her throat and long pendants in her ears.
“How do I look?” Amy asked, when her toilet was completed.
“I think you will be the belle of the evening,” Sherry answered, and Amy, who was beginning to be strangely drawn towards this girl whom she could not understand, said, next: “You will want to see the dance. There will be a crowd looking in at the windows from the piazza, and if you like come in and sit by the door.”
It was a good deal for Amy to unbend in this way, and she felt chagrined that Sherry did not seem more impressed with the permission to sit by the door.
“Thanks. You are very kind,” was all she said, as she left the room.