Page:The Lark - E Nesbit, 1922.djvu/184

Rh Them big white lily flowers yer give away in the sixpenny mixed bunches, they're charging threepence the piece for, and putting them in funeral wreaths with made-in-hair ferns and big pinks something beautiful. Why don't you sell wreaths for funerals, miss? Now that's a thing I really could enjoy making up, them funeral wreaths. I could easy learn how. There was a young man at it in one of the shops. I could see by the way he looked at me with one eye he'd be only too pleased to show me how, if I was to encourage him."

"Now, Gladys," said Jane firmly, "you really must not begin encouraging young men."

And she explained carefully how important it is for business girls to think only of business and not of young men, and how courting and love's young dream should be left till later on. Gladys listened kindly, smoothing out the many-coloured feather-flowers of her best hat, and when Jane had quite ended the little sermon she said:

"Yes, miss; but your 'art's your 'art, ain't it? And there's so much competition too. If you let your chances go when you're young you may find yourself an old maid all of a sudden, and wish you'd acted different. Now what I say is, you should always have two or three of them anxious for you to say 'Yes,' and go on not saying it, and being taken to fairs and the pictures, and chocs. and cigs. and something to look forward to on your evening out. And if you find any time that you're getting old—why, then there's always someone ready for you to say 'Yes' to, and you can try how you like being a married lady."

"Well," said Jane, "all I insist on is that you don't bring them here."

"Not me, you may rely," Gladys assured her earnestly. "Why, they'd get talking together! Keep 'em well apart's my rule." Jane was not sorry to get away from the subject. She felt that in her life too there were two young men who were best apart. And she perceived that Gladys might not unreasonably defend herself by a . But Gladys's