CHAPTER XV. “AS PROUD AND AS PRETTY AS A PRINCESS.

Floy was taken to Mr. Maury’s palatial store, on one of the most prosperous business thoroughfares of New York, and given a position behind the handkerchief counter.

Her genial, sunny nature, always looking at the bright side of everything, soon attracted admiring friends among her fellow employés, and made her popular with the elegant customers who patronized the well-known importing house.

She was so frank, so pretty, so engaging that it was a pleasure to be waited on by such a girl, who, while eager to please, did not feel abashed by the notice of the stately ladies of the grand Four Hundred, nor permit herself to be patronized by them. She had a rare and graceful dignity, this wild rose of a girl, that repelled insolence and patronage alike. When her fellow salesgirls twitted her on her air of easy independence, declaring that it would give offense, she tossed her shining head and answered, saucily:

“Why, I am as good as they are, so why should I cringe to them? Money is the only difference between us.”

They laughed at her; but in their hearts they admired her independence, and they said among themselves that there was not a rich girl who came to the store half as pretty and dainty as merry little Floy, in her cheap blue dress that set off to such advantage her flower-like face, and tiny dimpled hands with their exquisite taper fingers.

Floy would not own even to herself that she really occupied a very subordinate position in the world, for there was some proud blood in her veins that made her hold her little head high; and, besides, didn’t she know in her heart that she was engaged to the son of a millionaire--the dearest fellow in the world, too, who was coming back in a month to claim her for his happy bride?

She said to herself blithely enough that this selling handkerchiefs across a counter was only an episode in her life, brought about by the jealous malice of Miss Maybelle Maury, and that it would soon be over forever. Next year she would be coming to Maury & Co.’s in her own liveried carriage to buy the costly handkerchiefs of web-lace and fine embroidery. How the girls she worked with now would stare and nudge each other with surprise when she appeared!

She had a foretaste of this one day when a beautiful, brown-eyed woman sailed up to the counter and set all the clerks whispering to each other.

How grand she was, how stately! and her gray gown was a Parisian importation--all the girls knew that, even Floy, though she had been in New York barely a week.

The lady asked for lace handkerchiefs in a musical voice that made Floy’s heart leap wildly, while the frankly admiring brown eyes made her blush like a wild rose; the voice and the eyes were so like--so like those that Floy dreamed of every night.

She was a little nervous while she displayed the beautiful handkerchiefs; some of the girls noticed it, and they whispered to one another that Floy was losing some of her saucy independence, and was overawed at last by a Fifth Avenue swell.

The lady was very kind and gracious, and she looked admiringly at the lovely salesgirl while she counted out the money--something over a hundred dollars--to pay for the dainty trifles she had purchased. As she was turning away, she said:

“Send the package to Mrs. Beresford, No. -- Fifth Avenue.”

Then Floy comprehended instantly that the handsome, gracious lady was none other than St. George Beresford’s mother.

She gazed after her almost yearningly till she had passed through the street door, then turned to replace the boxes of handkerchiefs on the shelves.

And as she did so, she noticed that the lady had carelessly left her well-filled purse on the counter under a drift of snowy lawn.

“Oh!” she cried, breathlessly, catching it up and rushing in swift pursuit.

The footman was just opening the carriage door for his lady when Floy appeared, her sweet face like a rose, her hair a tangle of gold in the sunshine.

“Madame--Mrs. Beresford--your purse! You left it on the counter!” she cried, incoherently.

“Thank you very much, my dear,” answered the lady, turning and taking the purse, and the girl’s hand with it. Gazing admiringly at Floy, she laughed sweetly, and exclaimed: “Do you know how I chanced to forget it? You are so very pretty, I kept staring at you as if you were a picture until the purse must have dropped unconsciously from my hand. It was very good of you to run after me with it, and I shall reward you with some of the contents.”

And she was opening the dainty gold-mounted _porte-monnaie_, when Floy’s little hand closed it impetuously.

“No, no, you must not--I can not accept it!” she exclaimed, confusedly, but with a little imperious air that bespoke secret indignation; and with a courteous bow to the surprised lady, she hurried back into the store.

Mrs. Beresford entered her carriage, feeling somehow as if she had been gently snubbed, and saying to herself, half smiling:

“The saucy little thing! I should have thought she would be glad to get five dollars so easily. I should have liked to reward her for her honesty, too, for some girls would have been mean enough to keep the purse. There’s five hundred dollars in it, too, that I brought out to spend on a bridal gift for Cousin Marion. But that girl, so lovely and dainty, made me forget everything. She’s proud enough and pretty enough for a princess, and it’s a pity she’s poor, for beauty is too often a curse to a poor salesgirl.”

When Floy ran back to finish putting away the handkerchief boxes, several curious girls hastened to help her and to congratulate her on having made such a handsome sale to Mrs. Beresford.

“She’s as rich as cream and peaches--her husband has so many millions he can’t count ’em,” declared one, rashly.

“Her house is a marble palace on Fifth Avenue. We will go out with you to see it Sunday, if you like.”

“Didn’t she make you a present for returning her purse?” queried another curious one.

“Certainly not,” Floy answered, proudly.

“She wouldn’t take it. I saw her push Mrs. Beresford’s purse back with so queenly an air that the lady stared with surprise,” laughed Nell Jarley.

The girls all made great eyes of wonder, and one said that Floy should have taken the reward.

Floy only listened, and smiled like one in a sweet waking dream. She was charmed with the gracious beauty of her lover’s mother, and she thought, with tender pride:

“When I am his wife I will create as much sensation as she does when she comes here to shop.”

And just then one of her mates said, carelessly:

“With all that money, the Beresfords have only two children, a son and daughter, to inherit it.”

“Is--is--the son married?” asked Floy, timidly; and they all laughed.

“What a question! Are you thinking of setting your cap for him, princess! No, he is not married yet, though they do say he has fallen in love with Mr. Maury’s eldest daughter. She is very lovely and stylish, and comes here often. St. George Beresford comes here, too, with his mother now and then. He is perfectly splendid.”

Floy wondered, with a throbbing heart, what they would say if they knew that she was betrothed to this grand Beresford.