One of the boarders was addressing Ada from the hall.
“They’re so young to be out alone,” Ada said. “They’ve always had someone to bring and take them from school.”
“Time they learnt to come and go alone, I guess. How long do you suppose you can go on working yourself to pieces, anyhow? If you want to do the best you can for these two young ’uns, bring them up to look after themselves. You were brought up like a sugar-plum, and you’re feeling it mighty bad now, I reckon, to be treated like pig-iron.”
“I know you mean kindly,” Ada said, “but at least I have had the benefit of refined surroundings in my youth. I can’t let little Sadie knock about like a street child.”
“Much like a street child she is, with her white starched petticoats, and dainty pinafores. It’s just killing you, child, that’s what it is, and coloured things are just as comfortable.”
“But we have only white things,” Ada said apologetically, “and I’m afraid I can’t buy any more just yet.”
“To be sure. I never thought of that,” the fat, good-natured boarder said laughingly. “What’s going to happen to you, child, when these fine things wear out. It does me good to look at your pretty figure in these well-cut gowns. But they won’t stand rough wear.”
Then Ada told her she was going to earn fifteen dollars a week at Madame Maude’s.
“You’ll have all the young men in the town coming to choose their sisters’ hats,” the boarder said, “and men are a deal more easily taken in than women folk. Madame Maude is a clever woman.”
(To be continued.)