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Page 53
She tore off the veil, and the sticky gloves from her cold hands, and all
the finery of silk waist and belt, and donned her old plain blue coat and
skirt in which she had arrived in Philadelphia. They had been frugally
brushed and sponged, and made neat for a working dress. Elizabeth felt
that they belonged to her. Under the jacket, which fortunately was long
enough to hide her waist, she buckled her belt with the two pistols. Then
she took the battered old felt hat from the closet, and tried to fasten it
on; but the pompadour interfered. Relentlessly she pulled down the work of
art that Lizzie had created, and brushed and combed her long, thick hair
into subjection again, and put it in its long braid down her back. Her
grandmother should see her just as she was. She should know what kind of a
girl belonged to her. Then, if she chose to be a real grandmother, well
and good.
Mrs. Brady was much disturbed in mind when Elizabeth came down-stairs. She
exclaimed in horror, and tried to force the girl to go back, telling her
it was a shame and disgrace to go in such garments into the sacred
precincts of Rittenhouse Square; but the girl was not to be turned back.
She would not even wait till her aunt and Lizzie came home. She would go
now, at once.
Mrs. Brady sat down in her rocking-chair in despair for full five minutes
after she had watched the reprehensible girl go down the street. She had
not been so completely beaten since the day when her own Bessie left the
house and went away to a wild West to die in her own time and way. The
grandmother shed a few tears. This girl was like her own Bessie, and she
could not help loving her, though there was a streak of something else
about her that made her seem above them all; and that was hard to bear. It
must be the Bailey streak, of course. Mrs. Brady did not admire the
Baileys, but she was obliged to reverence them.
If she had watched or followed Elizabeth, she would have been still more
horrified. The girl went straight to the corner grocery, and demanded her
own horse, handing back to the man the dollar he had paid her last
Saturday night, and saying she had need of the horse at once. After some
parley, in which she showed her ability to stand her own ground, the boy
unhitched the horse from the wagon, and got her own old saddle for her
from the stable. Then Elizabeth mounted her horse and rode away to
Rittenhouse Square.
CHAPTER XIII
ANOTHER GRANDMOTHER
Elizabeth's idea in taking the horse along with her was to have all her
armor on, as a warrior goes out to meet the foe. If this grandmother
proved impossible, why, then so long as she had life and breath and a
horse she could flee. The world was wide, and the West was still open to
her. She could flee back to the wilderness that gave her breath.
The old horse stopped gravely and disappointedly before the tall,
aristocratic house in Rittenhouse Square. He had hoped that city life was
now to end, and that he and his dear mistress were to travel back to their
beloved prairies. No amount of oats could ever make up to him for his
freedom, and the quiet, and the hills. He had a feeling that he should
like to go back home and die. He had seen enough of the world.
She fastened the halter to a ring in the sidewalk, which surprised him.
The grocer's boy never fastened him. He looked up questioningly at the
house, but saw no reason why his mistress should go in there. It was not
familiar ground. Koffee and Sons never came up this way.
Elizabeth, as she crossed the sidewalk and mounted the steps before the
formidable carved doors, felt that here was the last hope of finding an
earthly habitation. If this failed her, then there was the desert, and
starvation, and a long, long sleep. But while the echo of the cell still
sounded through the high-ceiled hall there came to her the words: "Let not
your heart be troubled.... In my Father's house are many mansions; if it
were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.... I
will come again and receive you." How sweet that was! Then, even if she
died on the desert, there was a home prepared for her. So much she had
learned in Christian Endeavor meeting.
The stately butler let her in. He eyed her questioningly at first, and
said madam was not up yet; but Elizabeth told him she would wait.
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