For the most part Nance's leisure half-hours were spent with Mr. Demry,
discussing a most exciting project. He was contemplating the unheard-of
festivity of a Christmas party, and the whole alley was buzzing with it.
Even the big boys in Dan's gang were going to take part. There were to
be pirates and fairies and ogres, and Nance was to be the princess and
do a fancy dance in a petticoat trimmed with silver paper, and wear a
tinsel crown.
Scrubbing the floor, figuring on the blackboard, washing dishes, or
sewing on buttons, she was aware of that tinsel crown. For one magic
night it was going to transform her into a veritable princess, and who
knew but that a prince in doublet and hose and sweeping plume might
arrive to claim her? But when Nance's imagination was called upon to
visualize the prince, a hateful image came to her of a tall, slender boy,
clad in white, with a contemptuous look in his handsome brown eyes.
"I don't know what ails Nance these days," Mrs. Snawdor complained to
Uncle Jed. "She sasses back if you look at her, an' fergits everything,
an' Snawdor says she mutters an' jabbers something awful in her sleep."
"Seems to me she works too hard," said Uncle Jed, still ignorant of her
extra two hours in the sweat-shop. "A growin' girl oughtn't to be doin'
heavy washin' an' carryin' water an' coal up two flights."
"Why, Nance is strong as a ox," Mrs. Snawdor insisted, "an' as fer
eatin'! Why it looks like she never can git filled up.
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