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for it, the second time because she brought the wrong one. The very best broom, used only on the freshest carpets, had a red tape tied around the handle, so it would not get mixed with the one used in the dining-room, or the rest of the house. Bridget helped carry out the rugs and put them over the clothes-line, and Margaret gently struck them with the wicker beater till all the dust was out. She knew she would injure them if she pounded as hard as she wanted to, so she was very careful to hit them softly, but to do it so often that they were clean when she was done. She laid them on the back porch, and brushed them with the whisk-broom afterward until they were like new; then they were folded and left in a corner of the dining-room, ready to go down when the halls were done. Her mother told her to go to the very top of the house and shut the doors of the rooms all the way down that no dust could get in. Then they moved the table and chair and umbrella jar out of the hall, and carried the coats and hats to the closet, and shut them up. The upper hall was very dark with all the doors closed which usually lighted it, so the gas was lit, that the corners might be easily seen. Beginning at the top of the house Margaret swept down the halls and stairs all the way, using her long-handled brush and taking a little whisk-broom, which was also soft for the corners and the stairs, putting the dust into the pan as she went along, especially on the stairs. Her mother wanted her to let Bridget wipe off the wood with oil, but Margaret begged to be allowed to do at least one floor and the lower stairs, so she would know just how to do it in her very own house, when she had one! She put on a large, strong pair of gloves, put a little oil in the dish from the bottle, dipped in her flannel cloth, and was going to begin when her mother stopped her. "Wring out the cloth," she said; "you are not going to wash the floor, only to wipe it." Then she went away until this part of the work was done, so she might not step on the wood while it was wet, and perhaps spoil the whole floor. The work was not very pleasant, perhaps, and the oil did not smell very nice, but it was interesting to do something new, and Margaret did not mind it at all. She wiped up one floor and one flight of stairs, and then wiped also the baseboard around the floor and the balustrades of the stairs, and when she was done it all looked so fresh and nice she wished
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