Nelson's head was poked out of her room.
"What is it, Miss Rosy? It's not your bed-time yet."
"No, but I want to look at my dress again. You promised I should."
"Well, just wait five minutes. I'm just finishing a letter that one of the men's going to post for me. I'll come to your room, Miss Rosy, and bring a light. It's getting too dark to see."
"Be quick then," said Rosy, imperiously.
She went back to her room, but soon got tired of waiting there. She did not want to go to the nursery, for Bee was there, and would begin asking her what she was doing.
"I'll go to mamma's room," she said to herself, "and just look about to see where she has put the frocks. I'm almost sure she'll have hung them up in her little wardrobe, where she keeps new things often."
No sooner said than done. Off ran Rosy to her mother's room. It was getting dusk, dark almost, any way too dark to see clearly. Rosy fumbled about on the mantelpiece till she found the match-box, and though she was generally too frightened of burning her fingers to strike a light herself, this time she managed to do so. There were candles on the dressing-table, and when she had lighted them she proceeded to search. It was not difficult to find what she wanted. The costumes were hanging up in the little wardrobe, as she expected, but too high for her to reach easily. Rosy went to the door, and a little way down the passage, and called Nelson. But no one answered, and it was a good way off to Nelson's room.
"Nasty, selfish thing," said Rosy; "she's just going on writing to tease me."
But she was too impatient, to go back to her own room and wait there. With the help of a chair she got down the frocks. Bee's came first, of course, because it wasn't wanted—Rosy flung it across the back of a chair, and proceeded to examine her own more closely than she had been able to do before. It was pretty! And so complete—there was even the little white mob-cap with blue ribbons, and a pair of blue shoes with high, though not very high, heels! These last she found lying on the shelf, above the hanging part of the wardrobe.