pretty prints for home-wear, and then I don’t see why you are n’t
fixed well enough for our short season.”
“Can’t I do anything with this barege? It ‘s one of my favorite
dresses, and I hate to give it up.”
“You wore that thoroughly out, and it ‘s only fit for the rag-bag.
Yes, it was very pretty and becoming, I remember, but its day is
over.”
Fanny let the dress lie in her lap a minute as she absently picked at
the fringe, smiling to herself over the happy time when she wore it
last and Sydney said she only needed cowslips in her lap to look
like spring. Presently she folded it up and put it away with a sigh,
but it never went into the rag-bag, and my sentimental readers can
understand what saved it.
“The ball dresses had better be put nicely away till next year,”
began Polly, coming to a rainbow colored heap.
“My day is over, I shall never use them again. Do what you like
with them,” said Fan calmly.
“Did you ever sell your cast-off finery, as many ladies do?” asked
Polly.
“Never; I don’t like the fashion. I give it away, or let Maud have it
for tableaux.”
“I wonder if you would mind my telling you something Belle
proposed?”
“If it ‘s an offer to buy my clothes, I should mind,” answered
Fanny, sharply.
“Then I won’t,” and Polly retired behind a cloud of arsenic-green
gauze, which made her look as if she had the cholera.
“If she wanted to buy that horrid new ‘gooseberry-colored gown,’ as
Tom calls it, I ‘d let her have it cheap,” put in Maud, who was of a
practical turn.
“Does she want it, Polly?” asked Fan, whose curiosity got the
better of her pride.
“Well, she merely asked me if I thought you ‘d be mortally
offended, if she offered to take it off your hands, as you ‘d never
worn it. You don’t like it, and in another season it will be all out of
fashion,” said Polly from her verdant retreat.
“What did you say?”
“I saw she meant it kindly, so I said I ‘d ask. Now between
ourselves, Fan, the price of that dress would give you all you ‘ll
want for your spring fixings, that ‘s one consideration; then here ‘s
another, which may have some weight with you,” added Polly
slyly. “Trix told Belle she was going to ask you for the dress, as
you would n’t care to wear it now. That made Belle fire up, and say
it was a mean thing to do without offering some return for a costly
thing like that; and then Belle said, in her blunt way, ‘I ‘ll give Fan
all she paid for it, and more, too, if it will be any help to her. I
don’t care for the dress, but I ‘d like to slip a little money into her
pocket, for I know she needs it and is too good to ask dear Mr.
Shaw for anything she can get on without.’ ”
“Did she say that? I ‘ll give her the dress, and not take a penny for
it,” cried Fan, flushing up with mingled anger toward Trix and
gratitude to Belle.
“That won’t suit her; you let me manage it, and don’t feel any
shame or anxiety about it. You did many a kind and generous thing
for Belle when you had the power, and you liked to do it; now let
her pay her debts, and have the same pleasure.”
“If she looks at it in that way, it makes a difference. Perhaps I ‘d
better the money would be an immense help only I don’t quite like
to take it.”
“Kings and queens sell their jewels when times are hard or they get
turned off their thrones, and no one thinks it anything amiss, so
why need you? It ‘s just a little transaction between two friends
who exchange things they don’t want for things which they do, and
I ‘d do it if I were you.”
“We ‘ll see about it,” said Fan, privately resolving to take Polly’s
advice.
“If I had lots of things like Fan, I ‘d have an auction and get all I