I'll go up to my room now, if
you don't mind."

"Do, dear. Do," said Edith, "and I'll come along too. I want to show
you something, anyhow. I've picked up the stunningest high-boy you
ever saw in your life. A real old one, worth two hundred and fifty,
but I got it for a hundred. I've put it right outside your room, and
very carefully--oh, _most_ carefully--with my own hands, Honey, I just
laid your things in it. I simply couldn't have the bureau drawers in
that room filled up, you know, with all the house-parties I'm having,
and you not here half the time. I knew _you_ wouldn't mind, and the
high-boy is so stunning!" We had gone upstairs and were approaching it
now. "I put all your underclothes in those long shallow drawers; and
your ribbons and gloves and things in these deep, low ones. And then
up here in the top I've laid carefully all the truck you had stowed
away in that little old white enameled desk of yours. The desk I put
up in the store-room. It wasn't decent for guests. I've bought a new
one to take its place. I do hope you'll like it. It's a spinet desk,
and stunning. Oh, dear--there it is now ten minutes of seven, and I've
simply got to go. I promised to pick up Alec at the Club on the way. I
don't believe I've told you I've had your room redecorated. I wish I
could wait and see if you're pleased. But I can't--simply can't! You
understand, don't you, dear? But make yourself comfy."

She kissed me then very lightly on the cheek, and turned and tripped
away downstairs. When I caught the purr of the vanishing limousine as
it sped away down the winding drive, I opened the door of my room. It
was very pretty, very elegant, as perfectly appointed as any hotel
room I had ever gazed upon, but mine no more. This one little sacred
precinct had been entered in my absence and robbed of every vestige of
me. Instead of my single four-poster were two mahogany sleigh beds,
spread with expensively embroidered linen. Instead of my magazine cut
of Robert Louis Stevenson pinned beside the east window was a signed
etching. Instead of my own familiar desk welcoming me with bulging
packets of old letters, waiting for some rainy morning to be read and
sentimentally destroyed, appeared the spinet desk, furnished with
brand new blotters, chaste pens, and a fresh book of two-cent stamps.
All but my mere flesh and bones had been conveniently stuffed into a
two-hundred and fifty dollar high-boy!

I could have burst into tears if I