Page:Elizabeth Jordan--Tales of the city room.djvu/97

 and here in the East. She is twenty-seven now and absolutely her own mistress. Come, I want you to meet her."

Before the newspaper woman could demur she found herself drawn by her friend toward the nun. Nearly everybody had gone, and the splendid figure in bridal attire was already moving toward the door. Miss Van Orden, spoiled and petted and a law unto herself, laid a detaining hand lightly on her arm.

"Before you go," she said, "I want my friend, Miss Herrick, to meet you. Miss Herrick thinks that what you are doing is all wrong, but she is full of admiration for the way you are doing it." The worldly speech and the little laugh that accompanied it tempered the inopportuneness of the presentation. Sister Ethelbert's lips parted in a quick smile.

"I regret there is not time," she said brightly, "to convince Miss Herrick that what I am doing is wholly right." The serenity of the eyes, fixed on the reporter's face with a sweet, unfaltering gaze, went far toward confirming Miss Herrick in her opinion that this woman had her own mind