"But, my dear," the old lady stammered, helpless before the audacity of the revolt. "I'm sure nobody wants to cross you—but—but—where's the carpet?"
"I'm not going to have that ugly green rag staring at me any longer!"
"My dear—"
"Don't 'my dear' me any more, grandma, please!"
Mrs. Ridge gasped, closed her thin lips tightly, then emitted,—
"Mildred, I'm afraid you are not quite yourself to-day," and she retreated to the rear room, where in the gloom were piled her rejected idols.
After an interval she returned to the fight, gliding noiselessly forth from the gloom. She was a very small and a very frail little body, and as Milly put it she was "always sneaking about the house like a ghost."
"I see that the kitchen things have not been touched, and the dining-room furniture—"
"And they won't be—until I have this room to suit me.... Sam, please move that desk a little nearer the window.... There!"
It was characteristic of Milly to begin with the show part of the premises first and then work backwards to the fundamentals, pushing confusion slowly before her. The old lady watched the colored man move the rickety mahogany back and forth under Milly's orders for a few more minutes, then her thin lips tightened ominously.