This idea did not suit Lucy, for she was very anxious that her sister should love her, and she thought if she were prettily dressed at first, she would be more likely to do so. As she looked in the glass while arranging her hair, she thought she never had seemed quite so ugly. The fact was, she was beginning to have a fretful expression, which was spoiling her face. Lucy had never heard that scowls must in time become wrinkles. She was not at all pleased with her simple appearance, but there seemed no way for her to wear any ornament, not even a hair ribbon, for her soft light curls were cut so closely, that they could only lie like her waxen doll's, in golden rings about her head.
Lucy was fond of dress, and she would have liked to wear jewellery to school, as many of the scholars did, but Mrs. Maxwell never allowed it. The little girl had a bracelet of her mother's hair, and this she, one morning, clasped on her arm under her apron, to be worn on the outside after she reached school, where Mrs. Maxwell could not see it. As she stopped on the road to change it, there came a sudden pang into her heart—she was deceiving, and with the gift of her dead mother; perhaps that dear mother could see her now, she thought; and hastily putting down her sleeve, she hurried to school.
Though the bracelet was not displayed, and no one around her knew that she wore it, she felt guilty and unhappy until it was restored to the box in which it was usually kept. The remembrance of that day checked her this morning, as she was about to place on her slender finger a ring which had been her mother's, and in her child-like dress, she went down to wait for her sister.
She found Harty at the front window, but by no means in a fit condition to give Rosa a welcome, for his face had not been washed since breakfast, and his dark curls were, as usual, in wild confusion.
"Here comes Miss Prim!" he shouted, as Lucy entered, "as neat as a new pin. For my part, I don't intend to dress up for Rosa; she'll have to see me this way, and she may as well get used to it at once. I do wish she'd come, I am tired of waiting; the clock struck ten five minutes ago. Hurrah! there's the carriage!" he cried, and was out of the room in an instant.
Lucy longed to follow, but she seemed fastened to her chair; there she sat, looking anxiously out of the window, as the carriage entered the yard and drove up to the door.
Her father got out first, and then gave his hand to a tall, slender girl, who sprang with one leap to the stops, and was locked in Harty's rough embrace.
"But where is little Lucy?" she asked, when Harty had ceased to smother her with kisses.
The voice was kind and cheerful, and Lucy stepped forward, hanging her head, and timidly putting out her hand.
Rosa overlooked the little hand, and clasped the bashful child tenderly in her arms.