THE HONOR GIRL by Grace Livingston Hill Read Free Book Online

done by then, and be off. She felt now as if she were running a race. She ought to have telephoned Bettina that she was not going to that concert and let her give her ticket to someone else, but there was no time to think of that. She fled to the other room, and was delighted to find that her assistants had both finished their tasks and were now at the upper hall. The house smelled pleasantly of soap and cedar oil. She glanced uneasily out the front door. It was more than time for her order from the city to arrive. What if it should not come at all?
    But she must not waste time thinking. She would get dinner ready as fast as possible before she had to open her parcels and dispose of their contents.
    She selected the serving-dishes first, and set them in the warming-oven; it was the way her aunt had taught her at home. She washed the lettuce, prepared the tomatoes, and set them, along with three pretty plates, on the sideboard with the bottle of salad-oil. She filled the sugar-bowl and the salt and pepper cellars, opened her cans of corn and beans, washed her potatoes, and got the roast ready to be put into the oven; then the delivery-car arrived with the things, and everything had to be attended to at once. In the midst of opening her packages she almost forgot the roast; but, when it was safely in the oven, she hurried back to her bundles.
    The women had finished the sweeping on the second floor, and were scouring the bathroom. She could hear their vigorous rubbings with sand soap on the sides of the bathtub and the old linoleum. She hurried the things out of their papers, rejoicing in their newness and whiteness. But there was no time to admire. Five minutes to a bed was all she had to spare. Could she do it?
    She spread on the sheets and blanket, smoothed a white coverlet over her father’s bed, plumped the pillows into fresh cases, and tucked the pretty yellow sateen eider-down quilt in an artistic roll at the foot. What a difference it made! Then she seized one of the bureau-scarfs and whisked it upon the bureau. The room was a changed place.
    With her heart swelling with pride and her arms filled with more sheets and blankets she went on to Eugene’s room, and wrought the same magic change there. By this time the two women were scrubbing the third-story stairs, and would soon be up to Jack’s room. She would wait to make up his bed and fix things till they came down.
    She went down to the kitchen again, and found the pies gently simmering away, beginning to brown, and the roast sizzling contentedly. Then she dressed out the sideboard in its cover, and began to set the table. At once the whole house took on a comfortable, festive appearance, and the savory odors let out when she opened the oven door began creeping up even to the second and third stories, so that the two black women felt the atmosphere, and talked in low tones about it.
    “She’s a right smart little girl,” said the mother. “Reckon her mother’d be proud of her.”
    “Did you see the shoes she had on?” whispered her daughter. “Say, Ma, I’d like some like those. If she stays here and we work for her again, I’m going to find out what she paid for them.”
    When the table was set, Elsie ran out into the yard, and picked a handful of yellow roses from the straggling old bush in the yard, and put them into a vase in the center of the table. They always had flowers of some kind on the dinner table at Aunt Esther’s. It gave the one little festive touch now that showed a woman had been at work trying to make things beautiful. The two helpers stopped on the stairs to admire.
    “Say, now, isn’t that pretty?” declared the mother, her eyes fixed on the bedecked table. “Say, aren’t you handy, now? Flowers certainly do make a difference. And those pumpkin pies certainly do smell good.”
    Lizzie stood enviously watching the graceful girl as she flitted to and fro, putting the napkins around and arranging the spoons and forks.
    Elsie set her