Then, in spite
of the vigilance of the editor-in-chief, an odd
unconventional bit of writing crept now and then into
the _Age_--an interview with some eccentric notability
with the piquancy of a page from Gyp, a bit of pathos
picked out of the common, streets, a fragment of
character-drawing which smiled visibly and talked audibly.
Elfrida in her garret drew a joy from these things. She
cut them out and read them over and over again, and put
them sacredly away, with Nadie's letters and a manuscript
poem of a certain Bruynotin's, and a scrawl from one
Hakkoff, with a vigorous sketch of herself, from memory,
in pen and ink in the corner of the page, in the little
eastern-smelling wooden box which seemed to her to
represent the core of her existence. They quickened her
pulse, they gave her a curious uplifted happiness that
took absolutely no account of any other circumstance.
There were days when Mrs. Jordan had real twinges of
conscience about the quality of Miss Bell's steak. "But
there," Mrs. Jordan would soothe herself, "I might bring
her the best sulline, and she wouldn't know no difference."
In other practical respects the girl was equally
indifferent. Her clothes were shabby, and she did not
seem to think of replacing them; Mrs.
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