off home. Oh, Helen, here's a letter for you. Come, you're too young for that sort of work," and her uncle laughed.
She lingered in the door-way opening it. Mr. Warfield had to go away before he had expected, but he begged her to take the High School examination and see how she stood. When he returned they would talk the matter over. It would be such a pity for her to stop here. He sent a list of questions for her to study out.
They hurried off home, and Betty was nothing loth. Uncle Jason said he would lay the matter before mother to-morrow. Helen better not say anything.
"And you'll be so fine riding out every day, and keeping company with big bugs that I don't see how you'll ever get back to us again. Mebbe you won't. The High School may be next step."
She squeezed Uncle Jason's arm in a sort of transport. A shadowy thought like this had crossed her brain.
Aunt Jane was out on the doorstep with some of the younger children.
"Well, you have come at last, after keeping one on tenterhooks and supper warmed up and got cold again, and no one knowing whether you were thrown out and killed or waylaid – "
"There mother, nothing happened except that Warren fellow went off and I waited and waited for him. I was bound to get my note. And we had supper at Mrs. Dayton's. I sent Helen there to wait for me."
"Oh, Helen – we couldn't think! Did you get the things? If you'd lost my money – " and Jenny made a threatening pause.
"I didn't lose anything." Helen began to unpack her satchel on the cleanest end of the dining table. "I found everything but the lace and the blue sewing silk, and Mr. Morris is going to order them by mail. He sent some samples of lace in case he couldn't find the exact match."
"But it's got to match," returned Jenny in a positive tone. "And I did want that blue silk to finish my stitching Monday night. If you'd come home early with it I could have finished it to-night. H'm, h'm," opening the parcel and nodding. "Mrs. Dayton got her house full? And what did you see nice? Have prices gone down any, but I s'pose its hardly time! And was the style out in their best? Are they wearing ruffles on skirts or just plain? And are they real scant? Dear me! I haven't been over to North Hope in a dog's age."
Helen didn't remember about skirts except that Mrs. Van Dorn's light silk had a beautiful black lace flounce. And the Madonna was still plain before her eyes.
"Well you are stupid enough," cried Jenny in disgust. "I think I'd used my eyes to a better purpose. And you didn't even bring home any fashion-papers!"
Mr. and Mrs. Mulford were still having a little bickering on the stoop. Then she came in, examined the gingham and the muslin, sent the children to bed, told Helen to take the things off the table, and said she was tired to death, and that no one ever thought about her, or cared whether they kept her up till midnight.
Helen was very glad to get away to bed, and live over the meal at Mrs. Dayton's, with its ease and refinement. How could she help building air-castles when youth is so rich in imagination, and hope is boundless! And if one unlooked-for thing happened, might not another?
CHAPTER III
AIR CASTLES WITH FOUNDATIONS
Aunt Jane said Helen must stay home from church Sunday morning, and help with the dinner. Joe Northrup and two cousins were coming to visit. In the afternoon all the younger portion went to Sunday School, and the little leisure Helen had afterward was devoted to reading aloud their library books. And when she came down Monday morning, Aunt Jane said in her brisk, authoritative fashion:
"Now, Helen, you fly 'round and get at the washing. See if you can't learn something useful in vacation. A big girl like you ought to know how to do 'most everything. I washed when I had to stand up on a stool to reach the washboard."
Considering that for the last two months Helen had helped with the washing before school time, and had often run every step of the way because she was late, the request did not strike her as pertaining strictly to vacation. She went about her work cheerily. Uncle Jason had whispered in her ear, "Don't you worry. I guess it will all come out right."
Then the clothes were folded down, and after clearing the dinner away, Helen began to iron. Aunt Jane dropped on the old lounge and took her forty winks, then changed her gown, put on a clean white apron, which Helen knew was for company, and the thought added to her blitheness. Between three and four Mrs. Dayton drove up in the coupé with Mrs. Van Dorn, who continued her journeying around. The Mulfords' front-yard was rather pretty, with two borders of various flowers in bloom, and, as the younger children had gone over to the woods, it was quiet and serene all about. Helen glanced out of the side window, and gave thanks for the decent appearance of the place.
The conversation seemed to be not altogether dispassionate. She heard Aunt Jane raise her voice, and talk in her dogmatic manner. Oh! what if she couldn't go! She clasped her hot hands up to her face, and the iron stood there on the cloth and scorched, a thing Aunt Jane made a fuss about.
Truth to tell, Mrs. Mulford had two minds pulling her in opposite directions. It would just spoil Helen to go. She would hate working in the shop afterward. She would be planning all the time to get to the High School. She knew enough for ordinary girls. She would have to work for her living, and she couldn't spend three years getting ready. There was a little feeling, also, that she didn't want Helen any nicer or finer than her own girls. They had a father who could help them along. Helen hadn't. And if education shouldn't do more for her than it had for her father!
But there was the money, and any kind of work that made actual money was a great thing in Mrs. Mulford's estimation. Nine or ten weeks. Twenty-seven or thirty dollars!
"You see, I'd counted on giving Helen a good training in housework this vacation. When girls go to school they aint good for much that way. And 'long in October she's going in the shop, and then she won't have much chance to learn. An' I d' know as it'll be a good thing for her to spend her time readin' novels an' settin' 'round dreamin' and moonin'."
"She'll read a good deal beside novels. Mrs. Van Dorn is a very intelligent woman, and keeps up to the times. She has all the magazines, and the fine weekly papers, and she knows more of what is going on in the big world than most of the men. Then Helen would assist me in many things. Oh! I would see that she'd learn something useful every day," Mrs. Dayton declared, with a bright smile.
"Then she aint fixed up. She's outgrown most of her clothes, an' I'd 'lotted on having her sew some. She can run the machine, and I don't believe in girls who can't do any sewing. I'd be ashamed to bring up one so helpless. Here's my Jenny making most of her weddin' things. We don't count on having a dressmaker till the last, to put on the finishing touches."
"About the clothes," began Mrs. Dayton in a persuasive tone, "I have two or three lawn dresses that would make over nicely for Helen. And you know I did quite a bit of dressmaking through Mr. Dayton's long illness. And there's my machine. She would have some time to sew. Oh, you could depend on me not to let her waste her time."
Mrs. Dayton had certainly been a thrifty woman, if it was on higher lines than anything Mrs. Jason aspired to. She had money in the bank, beside getting her house clear.
Aunt Jane's arguments seemed over-ruled in such a pleasant yet decisive manner that she began to feel out-generaled. Uncle Jason had said yesterday, "You'd better let her go. If they wanted her in the shop right away you'd send her. So what's the difference!"
"There's a great deal of difference," she answered sharply, but she couldn't quite explain it. For Helen the three dollars a week really won the day. Aunt Jane tried to stand out for the rest of the week, but
