Dora Deane | Page 8

to be bothered with a child to look after."
So for three more days little Dora looked out of the dingy window upon
the dirty court below, wishing her aunt would come, and wondering if
she should like her. At last, towards the close of Friday afternoon, there
was a knock at the door and a haughty- looking, elegantly dressed
young lady inquired if a little orphan girl lived there.

"That's her--Aunt Sarah," exclaimed Dora, springing joyfully forward;
but she paused and started back, as she met the cold, scrutinizing
glance of Eugenia's large black eyes.
"Are you the child I am looking for?" asked Eugenia, without deigning
to notice Mrs. Grannis's request that she would walk in.
"I am Dora Deane," was the simple answer; and then, as briefly as
possible, Eugenia explained that she had been sent for her, and that
early the next morning she would call to take her to the depot.
"Did you know mother? Are you any relation?" asked Dora, trembling
with eager expectation; and Alice, who, without her sister's influence,
would have been a comparatively kind-hearted girl, answered softly,
"We are your cousins."
There was much native politeness and natural refinement of manner
about Dora, and instinctively her little chubby hand was extended
towards her newly found relative, who pressed it gently, glancing the
while at her sister, who, without one word of sympathy for the orphan
girl, walked away through the winding passage, and down the narrow
stairs, out into the sunlight, where, breathing more freely, she
exclaimed, "What a horrid place! I hope I haven't caught anything.
Didn't Dora look like a Dutch doll in that long dress and high-neck
apron?"
"Her face is pretty, though," returned Alice, "and her eyes are
beautiful--neither blue nor black, but a mixture of both. How I pitied
her as they filled with tears when you were talking! Why didn't you
speak to her?"
"Because I'd nothing to say," answered Eugenia, stepping into the
carriage which had brought them there, and ordering the driver to go
next to Stuart's, where she wished to look again at a velvet cloak.
"It is so cheap, and so becoming, too, that I am half tempted to get it,"
she exclaimed.

"Mother won't like it, I know," said Alice, who herself began to have
some fears for the three hundred and fifty dollars.
"Fudge!" returned Eugenia, adding the next moment, "I wonder if she'll
have to buy clothes for Dora the first thing. I hope not," and she drew
around her the costly fur, for which she had paid fifty dollars.
Of course the cloak was bought, together with several other articles
equally cheap and becoming, and by the time the hotel bills were paid,
there were found in the purse just twenty- five dollars, with which to
pay their expenses back to Dunwood.
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There were bitter tears shed at the parting next morning in Mrs.
Grannis's humble room, for Dora felt that the friends to whom she was
going were not like those she left behind; and very lovingly her arms
wound themselves around the poor widow's neck as she wept her last
adieu, begging Mrs. Grannis not to forget her, but to write sometimes,
and tell her of the lady who had so kindly befriended her.
"We can't wait any longer," cried Eugenia, and with one more farewell
kiss, Dora went out of the house where she had experienced much of
happiness, and where had come to her her deepest grief.
"Forlorn. What is that old thing going for! Leave it," said Eugenia,
touching with her foot a square, green trunk or chest, which stood by
the side of the long, sack-like carpet-bag containing Dora's wardrobe.
"It was father's--and mother's clothes are in it," answered Dora, with
quivering lips.
There was something in the words and manner of the little girl, as she
laid her hand reverently on the offending trunk, that touched even
Eugenia; and she said no more. An hour later, and the attention of more
than one passenger in the Hudson River cars was attracted towards the
two stylish-looking ladies who came in, laden with bundles, and
followed by a little girl in black, for whom no seat was found save the

one by the door where the wind crept in, and the unmelted frost still
covered the window pane.
"Won't you be cold here?" asked Alice, stopping a moment, ere passing
on to her own warm seat near the stove.
"No matter; I am used to it," was Dora's meek reply; and wrapping her
thin, half-worn shawl closer about her, and drawing her feet up beneath
her, she soon fell asleep, dreaming sweet dreams of the home to which
she was going, and of the Aunt Sarah who would be to her a second
mother!