Page:Live and Let Live.djvu/25

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LOOKING FOR A PLACE.
25

girl—you can't depend on them Irish, and husband thinks, and so do I, the wages is too much."

Mrs. Lee saw Lucy's eye turning with most earnest appeal to her, and she was thinking how civilly to break off a treaty to which she was from the first determined not to accede, when they were again interrupted, this time by the entrance of the eldest Miss Kidder, followed by a milliner's girl with a bandbox, which was immediately opened, and two hats displayed for the mother's inspection. "Oh, ma, do say I may have this one," said the young lady; " it's only seven dollars and a half; Madame l'Epine asked ten at first, but she said it was so becoming to me it was a pity I should not have it! Oh, is not it a love? Madame says it's just like Mrs. ——," mentioning a name well known in the fashionable world and the milliner's world, and thence handed down to the humblest devotee to feathers and flowers in the city. Do say yes, ma."

The hat was tried on, and gave the daughter to the mother's eye so decidedly the air of bon ton, that the desired "Yes" was promptly spoken. This matter settled, Mrs. Kidder turned to Lucy. "Well, child, if you are a mind to come and do your best, I'll give you three dollars a month, and that is more than such a child as you can possibly earn."

"My child cannot undertake the work you expect from her for any wages," said Mrs. Lee.

"Oh, very well! very well! there are enough that will." Mrs. Lee was scarcely out of the room before the mother and young ladies vituperated the whole race of servants, who, they said, expected