Purdy's bright chintz. In the air-shaft
window she started three potato vines in bottles, but not satisfied with
the feeble results, she pinned red paper roses to the sickly white stems.
The nearest substitutes she could find for pictures were labels off
tomato cans, and these she tacked up with satisfaction, remembering Mrs.
Purdy's admired fruit pictures.
"'Tain't half so dark in here as 'tis down in Smeltses," she bragged to
Fidy, who viewed her efforts with pessimism. "Once last summer the sun
come in here fer purty near a week. It shined down the shaft. You ast
Lobelia if it didn't."
Nance was nailing a pin into the wall with the heel of her slipper, and
the loose plaster was dropping behind the bed.
"Mis' Purdy says if I don't say no cuss words, an' wash meself all
over on Wednesdays and Sat'days, she's goin' to help me make myself a
new dress!"
"Why don't she give you one done made?" asked Fidy.
"She ain't no charity lady!" said Nance indignantly. "Me an' her's
friends. She said we was."
"What's she goin' to give Dan?" asked Fidy, to whom personages from the
upper world were interesting only when they bore gifts in their hands.
"She ain't givin' him nothin', Silly! She's lettin' him help her. He gits
a quarter a hour, an' his dinner fer wheelin' Mr. Walter in the park."
"They say Mr. Jack's give him a room over the saloon 'til his maw
comes back."
"I reckon I know it. I made him! You jus' wait 'til December when
Dan'll be fourteen.
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