horizon
Eloise had never heard of them, but she became interested at once,
because Ruby Ann was so enthusiastic, and said, "I have two or three
white aprons I made myself. You can have one of them if you think
anybody will buy it."

"Buy it!" Ruby repeated, rubbing her hands in ecstasy. "It will bring a
big price when they know it was yours and you made it. I'll see that it
has a conspicuous place. And now I must go and see Mrs. Biggs again
about the sale. Good-by, and keep up your courage."

She stooped and kissed Eloise, who heard her next in the kitchen talking
to Mrs. Biggs, first of rubber bands and massage, and then of the
Rummage Sale. When she was gone Mrs. Biggs came in and sat down and
began to give her opinion of the Rummage Sale, and massage and rubber
bands, and first the Rummage. A good way to get rid of truck, and Ruby
Ann said they took everything. She had a lot of old chairs and a warming
pan and foot-stove, and she s'posed she might give the spotted brown and
white calico wrapper which Eloise had worn. It was faded and out of
style. Yes, on the whole, she'd give the wrapper. She never liked it
very well, she said; and then she spoke of the rubber band Ruby Ann had
recommended instead of wormwood and vinegar, and of which she did not
approve. What did Ruby Ann know? though, to be sure, she was old enough.
How old did Eloise think she was? Eloise had not given her age a
thought, but, pressed for an answer, ventured the reply that she might
be verging on to thirty.

"Verging on to thirty! More likely verging on to forty," Mrs. Biggs
said, with a savage click of the needles with which she was knitting Tim
a sock. "I know her age, if she does try to look young and wear a sailor
hat, and ride a wheel in a short gown! I'd laugh to see me ridin' a
wheel, and there ain't so much difference between us neither. I know,
for we went to school together. She was a little girl, to be sure, and
sat on the low seat and learnt her a-b-c's. I was four or five years
older, and sat on a higher seat with Amy Crompton, till the Colonel took
her from the district school and kep' her at home with a governess."

Mrs. Biggs was very proud of the acquaintance she had had with Amy
Crompton, when the two played together under the trees which shaded the
school-house the Colonel had built as _expiatory_ years before, and she
continued: "Amy, you know, is the half-cracked lady at the Crompton
House who sent the hat and slippers. Sh