Beautiful but Poor — page 57: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

_- ~ Sa Pf Be td ay - “fe ~ a = so ag Me ¥ SS * a ~ ~ . of * ~ ™ al, pe . = ale. x = a ~~ we c . J rx et ¥ i- ° ou Vara ho} Sarre Wim | or aS zs peruse: © atid, but whose was it? a f BEAUTIFUL BUT POOR. That the writer wanted to come to Hattie was certain. But who was that writer? Miss Scrimp would have given her false hair and teeth to know. Yes, or she would have fed her boarders on turkey for a week if she could have gotten old and tough ones at half price. If she had only known who to write be: or even to telegraph to, an answer would have gone back, signed: ‘‘Come along soon as you can—Hattie But- 23 ler.’ Bui Hattie would not have known it. Miss Scrimp, mean. as she was, would have spent five dollars for telegraphing ina moment if she could by that have got to the bottom of the mystery which so ter- ribly worried her, Little did she dream, while in this turmoil of dia appointment, that a pair of gleeful eyes were fairly dancing over her too evident annoyance; for Jessie Albemarle, after going noisily up stairs, as if to her work, had crept down as slyly as a mouse, and peep- ing through the key-hole, had been a witness to the opening of the letter. And when she saw Miss Scrimp put the letter under a book on a shelf near her bed, the brave lit- tle friend of Hattie Butler determined that, even though the seal was broken, the letter should reach its proper owner. “She'll go down to cut their slices of bread and meat for supper, and then [’ll get it,’’ said Jessie to herself. ‘“‘She will never let me cut the bread or meat for fear I’ll cut too thick, or maybe eat a bite or two while I’m cutting ’em. But Miss Hattie is so good to me that I will help her, and she shall have ee her letter whether I get whipped for it or not.”