FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95  
96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   >>  
ok naps in the morning? And then the blessed memory that there was no reason why she shouldn't do exactly as she pleased with her time, so long as the dishes were done after awhile, came to her. "There's no clock in the forest," she thought, smiling drowsily; and lay serenely on the pine-needles for another half hour. When she did go in, the quantity of dishes wasn't so terrific. There had been no courses. Each man had left behind him an entirely empty plate and mug and knife and fork; that was all. And Marjorie seemed to have more energy and delight in running about and doing things than she had ever known she possessed, in the heavy New York air. She washed the dishes and swept out the cabin with a gay good will that surprised herself. She tried to feel like Cinderella or Bluebeard's wife or some of the oppressed heroines who had loomed large in her past, but it wasn't to be done. After that she was so hungry--her own breakfast had been taken in bites, on the run--that she ate up all the remaining biscuits, after toasting them and making herself bacon sandwiches as she had for the men; quite forgetting that her own abode lay near, filled to repletion with stores of a quite superior kind. The bacon sandwiches and warmed-over coffee tasted better than anything she had ever eaten in her life. And then there was a whole long afternoon ahead of her, before she had to do a solitary thing for the men's supper! "I must have 'faculty'!" said Marjorie to herself proudly, thinking more highly of her own talents than she ever had before. The fact that as a filing-clerk she had not shone had made her rather meek about her own capacities. She had always taken it impudently for granted that she was attractive, because the fact had been, so to speak, forced on her. But there had been a very humble-minded feeling about her incapacity for a business life. Miss Kaplan, for instance, she of the exuberant emotions and shaky English, had a record for accuracy and speed in her particular line which was unsullied by a single lapse. And Lucille, lazy, luxury-loving Lucille, concealed behind her fluffinesses an undoubted and remorseless executive ability. Compared to them Marjorie had always felt herself a most useless person. That was why she always was meeker in office hours than out of them. And to find herself swinging this work, even for one meal, without a feeling of incapacity and unworthiness, made her very chee
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95  
96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   >>  



Top keywords:
Marjorie
 

dishes

 

feeling

 
Lucille
 
incapacity
 
sandwiches
 

impudently

 

granted

 

attractive

 

blessed


capacities
 
memory
 

forced

 

business

 

Kaplan

 

morning

 

minded

 

humble

 

solitary

 

afternoon


shouldn
 

supper

 

highly

 
talents
 

reason

 
filing
 
thinking
 

proudly

 

faculty

 

instance


exuberant

 

person

 
meeker
 
office
 

useless

 
ability
 

Compared

 

unworthiness

 

swinging

 

executive


remorseless

 

accuracy

 
record
 

emotions

 
English
 
unsullied
 

loving

 

concealed

 
fluffinesses
 

undoubted