"I want four white roses, each with two or three leaves," she cried.
Anna ran to bring them, while the Bird Woman added pins.
"Elnora," she said, "forgive me, but tell me truly. Is your mother so
poor as to make this necessary?"
"No," answered Elnora. "Next year I am heir to my share of over three
hundred acres of land covered with almost as valuable timber as was in
the Limberlost. We adjoin it. There could be thirty oil wells drilled
that would yield to us the thousands our neighbours are draining from
under us, and the bare land is worth over one hundred dollars an acre
for farming. She is not poor, she is--I don't know what she is. A great
trouble soured and warped her. It made her peculiar. She does not in
the least understand, but it is because she doesn't care to, instead of
ignorance. She does not----"
Elnora stopped.
"She is--is different," finished the girl.
Anna came with the roses. The Bird Woman set one on the front of the
draped yoke, one on each shoulder and the last among the bright masses
of brown hair. Then she turned the girl facing the tall mirror.
"Oh!" panted Elnora. "You are a genius! Why, I will look as well as any
of them."
"Thank goodness for that!" cried the Bird Woman. "If it wouldn't do, I
should have been ill. You are lovely; altogether lovely! Ordinarily I
shouldn't say that; but when I think of how you are carpentered, I'm
admiring the result."
The organ began rolling out the march as they came in sight.
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