The wash was unusually large that day and as the unpacking of the box had taken up some time, the clock was striking two just as the last clothespin was fastened in its place, and the last brown towel hung upon the currant bushes.  It was Mrs. Markham’s weakness that her wash should be fluttering in the wind before that of Mrs. Jones, which could be plainly seen from her kitchen window.  But to-day Mrs. Jones was ahead, and Melinda’s pink sun-bonnet was visible in the little back-yard as early as eleven, at which time the Markham garments had just commenced to boil.  The bride had brought with her a great deal of extra work, and what with waiting breakfast for her until the coffee was cold and the baked potatoes “all soggy,” and then cleaning up the litter of “that box,” Mrs. Markham was dreadfully behind with her Monday’s work.  And it did not tend to improve her temper to know that the cause of all her discomposure was “playing lady” in a handsome cashmere morning gown, with heavy tassels knotted at her side, while she was bending over the washtub in a faded calico pinned about her waist, and disclosing the quilt patched with many colors, and the black yarn stockings footed with coarse white.  Not that Mrs. Markham cared especially for the difference between her dress and Ethelyn’s—­neither did she expect Ethelyn to “help” that day—­but she might at least have offered to wipe the dinner dishes, she thought.  It would have shown her good will at all events.  But instead of that she had returned to her room the moment dinner was over, and Eunice, who went to hunt for a missing sock of Richard’s, reported that she was lying on the lounge with a story book in her hand.

“Shiffless,” was the word Mrs. Markham wanted to use, but she repressed it, for she would not talk openly against Richard’s wife so soon after her arrival, though she did make some invidious remarks concerning the handsome underclothes, wondering “what folks were thinking of to put so much work where it was never seen.  Puffs, and embroidery, and lace, and, I vum, if the ruffles ain’t tucked too,” she continued, in a despairing voice, hoping Ethelyn knew “how to iron such filagree herself, for the mercy knew she didn’t.”

Now these same puffs, and embroidery, and ruffles, and tucks had excited Eunice’s liveliest admiration, and her fingers fairly itched to see how they would look hanging on the clothes bars after passing through her hands.  That Ethelyn could touch them she never once dreamed.  Her instincts were truer than Mrs. Markham’s and it struck her as perfectly proper that one like Ethelyn should sit still while others served, and to her mistress’ remarks as to the ironing, she hastened to reply:  “I’d a heap sight rather do them up than to iron the boys’ coarse shirts and pantaloons.  Don’t you mind the summer I was at Camden working for Miss Avery, who lived next door to Miss Judge Miller, from New York?  She had just such things as these, and I used to go in sometimes and watch Katy iron ’em, so I b’lieve I can do it myself.  Anyways, I want to try.”