I suppose I might as well try you. References don't amount to much nowadays anyway. People give references to servants just to get rid of them sometimes, although of course the Agency people usually find out about them, but if I decide to try you, how long will you likely stick to your job? Provided you prove satisfactory, of course?"
Patty wrinkled up the dimples about her nose and mouth quaintly, “Why, I don't know what you want me to do, but if it is anything that I can reasonably do I should think I might promise to stay all winter. That would be my intention. I'm not a quitter!" There was just a suggestion of rippling laughter in Patty's tone.
In spite of herself, the lady softened. Somehow one couldn't talk to this pretty, well-dressed child as if she were an ordinary servant.
“Well, your duties won't be arduous,” she said looking at Patty doubtfully. “My husband's sister, Miss Sylvia Cole, goes South to-night for a short stay and needs a companion. She's not an invalid exactly, but she's elderly and she's a little peculiar. She won't have a maid, she's old-fashioned, you know. She likes to do things for herself, but she has to have someone with her who can do them for her when she is not feeling able, and she gets lonesome, too; doesn't like to go around alone. But it takes a lot of patience to wait on her. Do you think you could keep your temper? She won't stand anyone who is impudent."
“Oh, I'm sure I wouldn't be impudent!" said Patty, suddenly realizing that it was not going to be all fun to go to work, and quaking in the depths of her heart at the thought of the elderly ogress whom she was to serve. Ought she perhaps to say no, and run away quickly while the going was good, before she bound herself for a winter to this peculiar old person? But where could she go? No, she must take this job if she got it, for she had a sudden terror at the thought of night coming on and finding her alone and penniless in the great city.
"I believe I shall try you,” said Mrs. Horliss-Cole thoughtfully.
"I should say you better consult your sister-in-law. Mother, dear,” interrupted Marjorie pertly from her window-sill. “You know Aunt Sylvia. If she doesn’t like her, nothing doing!”
"Don’t interrupt, Marjorie. Your aunt has already given her consent to having Miss Morris and she doesn't need to know the difference. I really can't be bothered to go over the whole long argument again. She wanted Hester, you know, and I simply cannot spare her with all the fall sewing to be done. That's all right. Miss Fisher, I think I'll engage you. Is your trunk packed? You'll need to be here ready to begin your service by four o'clock, I should say. Can you get your trunk ready by that time?”
“I have only a suitcase with me,” said Patty, suddenly feeling very small and alone, and that's checked at the station. It won't take me long to get it."
“Oh, very well. You can have your trunk sent after. And if you like, you can ride down to the station now and we can arrange about salary and hours and so on, by the way. Then the chauffeur can bring you back while I'm at a committee meeting. Unless you have shopping to do. If so, he can wait for you.”
"Thank you, no," said Patty. "I'd rather take a little walk if you don't mind, unless there is something you want me to do. I've never been in New York before."
Mrs. Horliss-Cole turned and stared at her curiously:
“How strange!” she said, as if she were an article in a museum. "You really don't look it. You have quite a sophisticated manner. But I don't think I shall trust you for a walk. It would be too easy to get lost in New York and the time is too short to risk it. The chauffeur can take you about awhile in the car and tell you the points of interest. Miss Cole will be getting uneasy if you are not back here by half-past four. Come, we'll consider that settled."
Patricia, as she followed her employer through the luxurious period-rooms out to the car, felt suddenly depressed. She was glad, of course, that the matter was settled and that she had found something so altogether respectable as being companion to an old lady, and that she had found it so soon. But somehow there was that in the curt tone of Mrs. Horliss-Cole which put her into another class entirely. Nothing unkind. Oh, no! But a certain careless condescension in her manner as she swept along her wide halls, giving a last direction to the maid, calling the man-servant to order for allowing a chair to stand at a certain forbidden angle. It seemed that when she moved everything else had to move also, and now they were all following her, the man, the maid, and even her daughter, hurrying with long annoyed strides:
"I should like to know. Mamma, where I come in? I've been waiting all the time while you did that tiresome telephoning, and I told you I had to see you——!"
They drifted into the car and Patricia perceived that she was expected to get in also.
It seemed strange to ride out through those stem grilled gateways where a few moments before she had stood, a young, frightened stranger, watching this same car and this same unknown lady. And now she was in her employ and practically pledged to remain for the winter. She felt somehow like a little caged thing. Why had she not waited to see the great new city first, the city which she had always longed to see and be a part of? It would have been so delightful to go about it as she pleased and search out all the places of which she had read and heard. But of course she must not think of that now. She ought just to be glad she had the position.
Marjorie and her mother were talking earnestly. They paid no more attention to her presence than if she had been the tassel on the silk curtain of the car. It was something about a young man of whom Mrs. Horliss-Cole did not approve. She told her daughter that the thing must stop right where it was; there must be no more correspondence, nor even a farewell meeting. Marjorie must arrange the matter herself, and not make it necessary for her parents to get into it, or there would be no coming out for her that winter. She would simply be sent away to school for another year, where she could be watched most carefully. The young man appeared to be something connected with professional athletics, a prize-fighter even perhaps, and Marjorie had met him during her past year at school. He had come as coach for her basketball team. The mother had bitter blame for the teachers who allowed her daughter an opportunity for intimacy with one so low down in the social scale, and nothing but contempt for the girl who had so lowered herself as to want to make a friend of one whom her family despised. Patricia, watching Mrs. Horliss-Cole's lips, was reminded of her own mother's mouth when she was disapproving of her, so cold and haughty. Sitting there in a stranger's car, driving swiftly toward a life of service for a whimsical old lady whom she had never seen, Patty wondered if all mothers had mouths like that. If she ever married and had a daughter, would her mouth look like that when she talked to her? Could she possibly imagine herself as getting so far away from a dear daughter of her own as to talk in that cold, hard tone to her?
She eyed the other girl furtively, the girl with the big, bold, handsome eyes and the sullen mouth, and felt sorry for her. After all, perhaps all girls were misunderstood by their mothers, and perhaps the mothers were misunderstood, too. She could see that it might not be very pleasant for Mrs. Horliss-Cole to have her daughter corresponding with an embryo prize-fighter; but then, perhaps the mother had never made a friend of her daughter and therefore the girl was thrown on her own resources. She almost thought she would like to be friends with this queer, haughty girl. She reminded her much of a former roommate at college. But of course this Marjorie wouldn’t consider making a friend of her aunt's companion. She almost giggled a little to herself then as she thought of it. Companion! Companion with a capital C! How odd it was. And if she hadn't happened to have her little world upset back there a couple of days ago she would at this minute probably have been playing tennis or eating lunch on the terrace, or driving in somebody's wonderful racing car, or doing some one of a number of other delightful things at that house party. Evelyn would have been there, and they would have been going about together, apparently loving sisters, and she would have been accepting Hal Barron's attentions in a perfectly good sisterly innocence and never have suspected the hate in Evelyn's heart.
