Baldwin to lead the way, and followed her up the
stairs.
The top-rooms were two poor enough garret ones, nowise too good, it
seemed to Hester, for the poorest of human kind. In the largest, the
ceiling sloped to the floor till there was but just height enough left
for the small chest of drawers of painted deal to stand back to the
wall. A similar washstand and a low bed completed the furniture. The
last was immediately behind the door, and there lay the woman, with a
bolster heightened by a thin petticoat and threadbare cloak under her
head. Hester saw a pale, patient, worn face, with eyes large,
thoughtful, and troubled.
"Here's a kind lady come to see you, Mrs.!" said her landlady.
This speech annoyed Hester. She hated to be called kind, and perhaps
spoke the more kindly to the poor woman that she was displeased with
Mrs. Baldwin's patronizing of her.
"It's dreary for you to lie here alone, I'm afraid," she said, and
stroked the thin hand on the coverlid. "May I sit a few minutes beside
you? I was once in bed for a whole month, and found it very wearisome. I
was at school then. I don't mind being ill when I have my mother.
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