t
down with a box of water-colors to paint dinner-cards, and as her skilful
brush brought into being dainty landscapes, lovely flowers, and little
brown birds, she pondered the strangeness of her lot.

The table the next night was laid with exquisite care, the scant supply of
flowers having been used to best advantage, and everything showing the
touch of a skilled hand. The long hours that Mrs. Hart had spent
puckering her brow over the household department of fashion magazines
helped her to recognize the fact that in her new maid she had what she was
pleased to call "the real thing."

She sighed regretfully when the guest of honor, Mrs. Rhinehart, spoke of
the deftness and pleasant appearance of her hostess's waitress.

"Yes," Mrs. Hart said, swelling with pride, "she is a treasure. I only
wish I could keep her."

"She's going to get married, I suppose. They all do when they're good,"
sympathized the guest.

"No, but she simply won't do cooking, and I really haven't work enough for
two servants in this little house."

The guest sat up and took notice.

"You don't mean to tell me that you are letting a girl like that slip
through your fingers? I wish I had known about her. I have spent three
days in intelligence offices. Is there any chance for me, do you think?"

Then did the little woman prove that she should have had an _e_ in her
name, for she burst into a most voluble account of the virtues of her new
maid, until the other woman was ready to hire her on the spot. The result
of it all was that "Mary" was summoned to an interview with Mrs. Rhinehart
in the dining-room, and engaged at four dollars a week, with every other
Sunday afternoon and every other Thursday out, and her uniforms furnished.

The next morning Mr. Hart gave her a dollar-bill and told her that he
appreciated the help she had given them, and wanted to pay her something
for it.

She thanked him graciously and took the money with a kind of awe. Her
first earnings! It seemed so strange to think that she had really earned
some money, she who had always had all she wanted without lifting a
finger.

She went to a store and bought a hair-brush and a few little things that
she felt were necessities, with a fifty-cent straw telescope in which to
put them. Thus, with her modest baggage, she entered the home of Mrs.
Rhinehart, and ascended to a tiny room on the fourth floor, in which were
a cot and a washstand, a cracked mirror, one chair, and one