en, isn't it?"

Nancy followed her out of the door, saying as she thoughtfully chewed a
straw, "Muddy, I do believe that when you're getting on to sixteen the
rich nobleman or the fairy prince or the wonderful youngest son does
cross your mind now and then!"

XX

THE PAINTED CHAMBER

Matters were in this state of forwardness when Nancy and Kathleen looked
out of the window one morning and saw Lallie Joy Popham coming down the
street. She "lugged" butter and milk regularly to the Careys (lugging is
her own word for the act), and helped them in many ways, for she was
fairly good at any kind of housework not demanding brains. Nobody could
say why some of Ossian Popham's gifts of mind and conversation had not
descended to his children, but though the son was not really stupid at
practical work, Lallie Joy was in a perpetual state of coma.

Nancy, as has been intimated before, had a kind of tendency to reform
things that appeared to her lacking in any way, and she had early seized
upon the stolid Lallie Joy as a worthy object.

"There she comes!" said Nancy. "She carries two quarts of milk in one
hand and two pounds of butter in the other, exactly as if she was
bending under the weight of a load of hay. I'll run down into the
kitchen and capture her for a half hour at five cents. She can peel the
potatoes first, and while they're boiling she can slice apples
for sauce."

"Have her chop the hash, do!" coaxed Julia for that was her special
work. "The knife is dull beyond words."

"Why don't you get Mr. Popham to sharpen it? It's a poor workman that
complains of his tools; Columbus discovered America in an open boat,"
quoted Nancy, with an irritating air of wisdom.

"That may be so," Julia retorted, "but Columbus would never have
discovered America with that chopping-knife, I'm sure of that.--Is
Lallie Joy about our age?"

"I don't know. She must have been at least forty when she was born, and
that would make her fifty-five now. What _do_ you suppose would wake her
up? If I could only get her to stand straight, or hold her head up, or
let her hair down, or close her mouth! I believe I'll stay in the
kitchen and appeal to her better feelings a little this morning; I can
seed the raisins for the bread pudding."

Nancy sat in the Shaker rocker by the sink window with the yellow bowl
in her lap. Her cheeks were pink, her eyes were bright, her lips were
red, her hair was goldy-brown, her fingers flew, and a high-