“What does she care? Mr. Lewis Gesner is a gentleman, and he knows something.”
“He said once that I was only a little doll,” said Mrs. Wadsworth. “I never liked him afterward.”
“I like him,” said Dinah; “he doesn’t flirt with the girls; he always talks to the old ladies.”
“What are you going to do to-day, Tessa?” inquired Mrs. Wadsworth, ignoring Dinah’s remark.
“Oh, I don’t know,” she answered, “and don’t care” was the unspoken addition.
There was one thing she was sure to do. On her way to the ten o’clock mail she would take a moment with Miss Jewett for a word, a look; for something to set her heart to beating to a cheerier tune. Ten minutes before mail time she found Miss Jewett as busy as a bee.
“Oh, Tessa,” glancing up from her desk, “I knew you would come. I had a good crying spell on my twenty-fifth birthday and I’ve looked through clear eyes ever since. I wish for you that your second quarter may be as full of hard work as mine.”
Tessa felt as if the sun were shining warm again. At the office she received her birthday present; the one thing that she most wished for; if ever birthday face were in a glow and birthday heart set to dancing, hers were when her fingers held the check for one hundred and sixty-eight dollars and fifty cents, and when her eyes ran through the brief, friendly letter, with its two lines of praise.
“I am taken with your book. It gives me a humbling-down feeling. I hardly know why.”
“Oh, it’s too good! it’s too good,” she cried, with her head close to Miss Jewett’s at the desk over the large day-book. “I was feeling as if nobody cared, and now he wants another book. As good as this, he says.”