“I would rather die of typhoid fever than have that woman bragging to her vulgar friends that she gives the Beaumonts, Governor Beaumont’s daughters, water! I know what her kindness means.” Thus Henriette crushed Mysie. But when the organ began, and it was evident that Tim Armstrong intended to learn “Two Little Girls in Blue,” if it took him all the afternoon, Mysie rose.
“Mysie,” called Henriette, “don’t you go one step to the Armstrongs’.”
Mysie sat down, but in a little while she tried again.
“I wish you’d let Paula, then; she is going by there every day, and she has had no dispute with them. She often stops to talk.”
“Talk to whom?” said Henriette, icily.
“Oh, to any of them—Tim or Pete or Mrs. Armstrong.”
“Does she talk to them long?”
“Oh no, not very long—just as she goes by. I think you’re mistaken, sister. They don’t think such mean things. Truly they are—nice; they seem very fond of each other, and they almost always give Paula flowers.”
“What does she do with the flowers?”