Читать книгу Adele Doring of the Sunnyside Club онлайн

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“Eva,” said Mrs. Friend, putting her arm about the girl and kissing her on the forehead, “we want to congratulate you on this your thirteenth birthday.”

Eva blushed rosily as she replied happily, “Oh, thank you, Mrs. Friend.”

Then the matron continued, “Because it is Eva’s birthday, I am going to give you other girls who are near her own age a half-holiday, and so you may go now and take your baths and put on your best white dresses.”

“Oh, goodie! goodie!” cried several of the girls, as they clapped their hands gleefully. Then out of the door they went, remembering to be quiet in the halls. An hour later, fresh from the bath, they donned their best white dresses and their butterfly hair-ribbon bows, which their matron had given to them at Christmas.

Eva, like a princess among her maidens, beamed on them all as she exclaimed: “You girls do look so pretty, every one of you! But,” she added suddenly, “where is Amanda Brown?”

No one knew. She had not been in the bath-room, nor had she dressed, for her white gown was still lying on her cot.