Page:An Old Fashioned Girl.djvu/25

Rh "La, child! you needn't mind that. I'll take care of you, and fix you up, so you won't look odd.

"Am I odd?" asked Polly, struck by the word, and hoping it didn't mean anything very bad.

"You are a dear, and ever so much prettier than you were last summer, only you've been brought up differently from us; so, your ways ain't like ours, you see," began Fanny, finding it rather hard to explain.

"How different?" asked Polly again, for she liked to understand things,

"Well, you dress like a little girl, for one thing."

"I am a little girl; so, why shouldn't I?" and Polly looked at her simple blue merino frock, stout boots, and short hair, with a puzzled air.

"You are fourteen; and we consider ourselves young ladies at that age," continued Fanny, surveying, with complacency, the pile of hair on the top of her head, with a fringe of fuzz round her forehead, and a wavy lock streaming down her back; likewise, her scarlet-and-black suit, with its big sash, little pannier, bright buttons, points, rosettes,—and, heaven knows what. There was a locket on her neck, earrings tinkling in her ears, watch and chain at her belt, and several rings on a pair of hands that would have been improved by soap and water.

Polly's eye went from one little figure to the other, and she thought that Fanny looked the oddest of the two; for Polly lived in a quiet country town, and knew very little of city fashions. She was rather impressed by the elegance about her, never having seen Fanny's home before, as they got acquainted