"We could not offer them for sale, and she does not want them back," she said.
"Send them to the Colonel. She'll never know it, and the chance is will never think of them again," Howard said, and then hurried outside to where Eloise was still waiting and talking to Tom.
"That apron went first rate," he said. "You must have felt glad they thought so much of you, 'cause 'twas you and not the apron, though that was pretty enough."
"Oh!" Eloise replied, drawing her ermine cape around her shoulders, "I don't know whether I was glad or not. I felt as if I were being sold to the highest bidder."
"That's so," Tom said. "It was something like it. Ain't you glad 'twas Mr. Harcourt bought you instead of t'other?"
Eloise laughed as she replied, "Why, Thomas, it was you who bought me! Have you forgotten?"
She seemed so much in earnest that for a moment Tom thought she was, and said, "You ain't so green as not to know that 'twas Mr. Harcourt eggin' me on,—winkin' to me when to raise, and tellin' me to go high! You are his'n, and I'm glad on't! I like him better than t'other; ain't so big feelin'. Here they come, both on 'em."
Howard had finished his business with Ruby Ann, and Jack had paid his five dollars and received the apron, slightly mussed, but looking fairly well in the box in which they put it. A good many people were leaving the rooms again, and among them Tim, laden with his mother's dish pan and towels, and dress and brass kettle, and one or two articles which she had bought.
"Hallo, Tim! You look some like a pack horse," Tom said, but Tim did not answer.
He was very tired, for with so many calling upon him through the day and evening; he had run miles and received only seventy cents for it. He was chagrined that he had raised his own bid, and wondered Tom did not chaff him. It would come in time, he knew, and he felt angry at Tom, and angry with the brass kettle and dish pan and dress which kept him from wheeling Eloise instead of Tom, who, when they finally started, took his place behind the chair as a matter of course, while Howard and Jack walked on either side. It was a splendid night, and when Mrs. Biggs's house was reached Howard and Jack would gladly have lingered outside talking to Eloise, if they could have disposed of the boys. But the boys were not inclined to be disposed of. Tom had become somebody in his own estimation, and intended to stay as long as the young men did, while Tim, having found the key, this time instead of entering by the pantry window, unlocked the door, deposited his goods, and then came back, saying to Eloise with a good deal of dignity for him, "Shall I take you in?"