"Would you mind doing housework?" "Not at all," I replied, full of new hopes. She reached for one of the large books, and turned the leaves over. "Would you like to go in the country?" "With all my heart." At that she nodded eagerly, and pointing with her finger at a place in the book, she said: "There is something which I am sure that you would like. The lady here is trying to find a girl who speaks German and who would not object to do the work in the house, besides being a companion to her daughter aged fourteen. There is also a young French woman who is to help you. What do you say to it?" I thought of the eight beds as well as the girls in the home, and said that I should feel very happy if I could obtain that situation. "The lady is coming again at two o'clock, and if you like you may wait here and speak with her." Controlling my joy as well as I could, I decided to wait, and sat down on my chair again. The lady arrived in about an hour. She looked nearly forty years of age, and was very kind. She only repeated what I had heard already, and I agreed to everything. Finally she gave me a card with her name and address upon it, and told me to start two days later. When everything was settled she held out her hand to me, but took it back again as if she had thought of something. "Have you had your dinner?" "No," I said truthfully. "Then you must come with me." She made me sit down in the carriage in which she had come, and a little later we were seated round a table. "What would you like to eat?" she asked me. I said it was all the same to me, whereupon she ordered a lovely dinner and looked much pleased that I liked it. When I had finished she took me into the street again and looked round for one of the red motor-buses. She soon spied one and begged the conductor to take care of me, and to tell me when I had to get out. Then she nodded to me once more and I rode back to the home. As soon as I got there I went to the directress and reported my good luck. She, however, looked a little doubtful. "The whole matter is somewhat suspicious," she said; "it has gone too quick, but all that we can do is to trust in Him." I assured her that I did so, and then I went up into the bedroom and wrote to my friend a letter of some length. The girls who had left the home with me in the morning returned towards supper-time and inquired a little scornfully whether I had got a situation. After I had told them of my success they looked greatly surprised and asked me to tell them all about it. I told them all I knew, and after I had finished the tall, fair girl again shrugged her shoulders. "That is only the place of a kitchen-maid, but for doing the cooking and scrubbing the floors I am too good, I think;" and while she said that she turned her hat into another shape. Chapter XV