sat up on her heels again and stared. She spoke in broad
Yorkshire in her amazement.

"Canna' tha' dress thysen!" she said.

"What do you mean? I don't understand your language," said Mary.

"Eh! I forgot," Martha said. "Mrs. Medlock told me I'd have to be
careful or you wouldn't know what I was sayin'. I mean can't you put on
your own clothes?"

"No," answered Mary, quite indignantly. "I never did in my life. My Ayah
dressed me, of course."

"Well," said Martha, evidently not in the least aware that she was
impudent, "it's time tha' should learn. Tha' cannot begin younger. It'll
do thee good to wait on thysen a bit. My mother always said she couldn't
see why grand people's children didn't turn out fair fools--what with
nurses an' bein' washed an' dressed an' took out to walk as if they was
puppies!"

"It is different in India," said Mistress Mary disdainfully. She could
scarcely stand this.

But Martha was not at all crushed.

"Eh! I can see it's different," she answered almost sympathetically. "I
dare say it's because there's such a lot o' blacks there instead o'
respectable white people. When I heard you was comin' from India I
thought you was a black too."

Mary sat up in bed furious.

"What!" she said. "What! You thought I was a native. You--you daughter
of a pig!"

Martha stared and looked hot.

"Who are you callin' names?" she said. "You needn't be so vexed. That's
not th' way for a young lady to talk. I've nothin' against th' blacks.
When you read about 'em in tracts they're always very religious. You
always read as a black's a man an' a brother. I've never seen a black
an' I was fair pleased to think I was goin' to see one close. When I
come in to light your fire this mornin' I crep' up to your bed an'
pulled th' cover back careful to look at you. An' there you was,"
disappointedly, "no more black than me--for all you're so yeller."

Mary did not even try to control her rage and humiliation.

"You thought I was a native! You dared! You don't know anything about
natives! They are not people--they're servants who must salaam to you.
You know nothing about India. You know nothing about anything!"

She was in such a rage and felt so helpless before the girl's simple
stare, and somehow she suddenly felt so horribly lonely and far away
from everything she understood and which understood her, that she threw
herself face downward on the pillows and burst into passionate sobbing.
She sobbed so unres