It was a very peaceful face which presented itself in the kitchen not many moments thereafter, and the voice that spoke seemed to Dorothy, who looked on and listened, the very essence of the morning sunshine.
"Mother, it was certainly very careless in me to invite anybody to tea without first learning whether it would be convenient for you. If you will forgive me this time I won't do it a 'bit more.' That is what my little sister says when she gets into trouble. Now, I want to know if you will let me hang some of my pictures in the parlour; I've been unpacking them, and I don't know what to do with half of them."
"Of course," said Mother Morgan. "Fix the parlour as you want it. It never was called a parlour before in its life; but I daresay that is as good a name as any. The extra ironing is no consequence anyhow; we always have enough to eat. He might as well come to-day as any time, for all I know."
Then she dashed out at that end door again, and set the outer kitchen door open, and stood in it looking off toward the snowy hills. Nobody over apologized to her before; it gave her a queer feeling.
"Well," said Dorothy, addressing the dust-pan after Louise had vanished again, "I never could have said that in the world. After what mother said to her too. I don't care; I like her first-rate. There now."
[CHAPTER XII.]
DIFFERENT SHADES.
THAT front room was square and bare; at least that last word expresses the impression which it made upon Louise as she stood surveying it. There were several things that she felt sure she could do to brighten it, but the question turned on expediency. How much would it be wise to undertake?
It is a curious fact that the people who, from choice or necessity, have contented themselves with paper window-shades, have also been the people fated to choose for these ungainly creations colours that would fight with the shades of carpet and wall-paper. Those in the Morgan household were the ugliest of their kind, and the initiated know that is saying a great deal. The ground-work was blue. Who ever saw a tint of blue that would harmonize with a cheap ingrain carpet? They were embellished by corner pieces, done in dingy brown, with streaks of red here and there; the design looking like nothing with sufficient distinctness to be named—the whole being grotesque; while in the centre was a bouquet of flowers so ugly that it was a positive relief to remember that nature never produced anything in the least like them. An old-fashioned piece of furniture, known as a settle, suggested possibilities of comfort if it had not been pushed into the coldest corner of the room and been disfigured by a frayed binding and a broken spring. The chairs, of course, were straight-backed and stiff; and set in solemn rows. But the table, with its curious clawed legs and antique shape, filled Louise's heart with delight.
"What a pity," she said aloud, "that they couldn't have put some of the grace into the old-fashioned chairs which they lavished on those delightful old tables! How that bit of artistic twisting would delight Estelle's heart!"