Yet even as she spoke Brenda could but admit to herself that Martine had an air of dignity suited to one much older than a girl of seventeen. But if she had thought Martine altogether grown up, she quickly changed her opinion, for at this very moment Martine sank on the floor beside her, and as her laughter re-echoed through the rooms Brenda was driven to say: "My dear, don't talk to me about being grown up. You act precisely like a child of ten. What in the world is the matter?" "Nothing, oh nothing; that is, almost nothing. Only look and you will laugh too." Glancing where Martine pointed, Brenda saw something really amusing. Before a pier-glass in the hall a sallow girl with glossy black hair piled high on her head was standing. She wore a pink satin gown that heightened her sallowness. It was cut square in the neck, and her elbow sleeves displayed a pair of skinny arms. "Who is she?" whispered Martine, recovering her breath. "Why, that, oh that is Angelina." Martine, fascinated by the vision in the glass, continued to watch the strange little figure, bowing, gesticulating, turning now to this side now to that, while her lips moved as if she were talking to herself. "Who is Angelina?" asked Martine. "Oh, Angelina, don't you know her? She is to help me for a week while Maggie is away taking care of her sick aunt." "Do you call that 'helping'?" and again Martine pointed toward the pier-glass. "She did not hear me come in; she thought I would ring," replied Brenda. "She thinks I am still downtown. She was to go to the door and has been waiting to hear me ring." "Would she go to the door looking like that?" "Oh, I hope not. She'd probably call through the tube and hurry on a coat, or do something of that kind. Yet no one is ever surprised at Angelina's doings. Let me tell you about her. Years ago Nora and some of the rest of us pulled her little brother Manuel from under the feet of a horse, and in a few days we went to visit the family at the North End. You can't imagine how poor they were. Then we had a club and worked for a bazaar to raise money to get them out into the country." "Oh, yes, Amy told me something about that, though it all happened before she knew you, I think she said." "Well, in the end Angelina became my cousin Julia's protégée. She has learned a great deal about housework at the Mansion School, but she is always yearning for something beyond. Lately she has been taking lessons in elocution." "That's it, then, she's rehearsing now," cried Martine. "Oh, I hope Maggie will stay away longer than you expect. I think we might have great sport with Angelina." "My dear," remonstrated Brenda, "remember that for the present you are my ward. I can't have you trifling with Angelina, although she can be very funny." The sound of voices had at last penetrated Angelina's ears, and she fled to her room. "Oh, my," she thought, "I wonder if Mrs. Weston saw me?" In her secret heart Angelina hoped that she had been observed.