Mrs. Bassett had observed that Sylvia’s appetite was excellent, and this had weakened her belief in the girl’s genius; there was a good deal of Early-Victorian superstition touching women in Hallie Bassett!  But Mrs. Owen was speaking.

“I suppose I’d see less of you all if you moved to town.  Marian used to run off from Miss Waring’s to cheer me up, mostly when her lessons were bad, wasn’t it, Marian?”

“I love this house, Aunt Sally, but you can’t have us all on your hands all the time.”

“Well,” Mrs. Owen remarked, glancing round the table quizzically, “I might do worse.  But even Sylvia scorns me; she’s going to move out to-morrow.”

Mrs. Bassett with difficulty concealed her immeasurable relief.  Mrs. Owen left explanations to Sylvia, who promptly supplied them.

“That sounds as though I were about to take leave without settling my bill, doesn’t it?  But I thought it wise not to let it get too big; I’m going to move to Elizabeth House.”

“Elizabeth House!  Why, Sylvia!” cried Marian.

Mrs. Bassett smothered a sigh of satisfaction.  If Aunt Sally was transferring her protegee to the home she had established for working girls (and it was inconceivable that the removal could be upon Sylvia’s own initiative), the Bassett prospects brightened at once.  Aunt Sally was, in her way, an aristocrat; she was rich and her eccentricities were due largely to her kindness of heart; but Mrs. Bassett was satisfied now that she was not a woman to harbor in her home a girl who labored in a public school-house.  Not only did Mrs. Bassett’s confidence in her aunt rise, but she felt a thrill of admiration for Sylvia, who was unmistakably a girl who knew her place, and her place as a wage-earner was not in the home of one of the richest women in the state, but in a house provided through that lady’s beneficence for the shelter of young women occupied in earning a livelihood.

“It’s very nice there,” Sylvia was saying.  “I stopped on my way home this afternoon and found that they could give me a room.  It’s all arranged.”

“But it’s only for office girls and department store clerks and dressmakers, Sylvia.  I should think you would hate it.  Why, my manicure lives there!”

Marian desisted, warned by her mother, who wished no jarring note to mar her satisfaction in the situation.

“That manicure girl is a circus,” said Mrs. Owen, quite oblivious of the undercurrent of her niece’s thoughts.  “When they had a vaudeville show last winter she did the best stunts of any of ’em.  You didn’t mention those Jewesses that I had such a row to get in?  Smart girls.  One of ’em is the fastest typewriter in town; she’s a credit to Jerusalem, that girl.  And a born banker.  They’ve started a savings club and Miriam runs it.  They won’t lose any money.”  Mrs. Owen chuckled; and the rest laughed.  There was no question of Mrs. Owen’s pride in Elizabeth House.  “Did you see any plumbers around the place?” she demanded of Sylvia.  “I’ve been a month trying to get another bathroom put in on the third floor, and plumbers do try the soul.”