Page:Leah Reed--Brenda's summer at Rockley.djvu/345

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BRENDA’S SUMMER AT ROCKLEY
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ashamed when he finds that I know about that money that he ’ll give it up at once. Can’t we go to Derby Street rather soon? When I want to do a thing, I’m always impatient to get through with it.”

“The Custom House is in Derby Street,” said Amy; “but I did n’t think we’d go there until we’d visited the Institute and one or two places in this neighborhood. It’s a little out of the way.”

“Just as likely as not he does n’t live there at all,” and Julia laid her arm on Brenda’s shoulder. “If I were you, I’d give it up.”

“There are a number of foreigners down at the other end of Derby Street,” said Amy; “but I did n’t know that there were any Portuguese there; they are Poles, a great many of them, and they work in the factories.”

“There!” cried Brenda,—“there!” and without a word of explanation she darted across the street. On the opposite corner was a queerly-dressed gypsy woman with a basket on her arm. Julia recognized the red-and-black striped shawl, and the large black bonnet with its bow of scarlet ribbon. It was the gypsy woman whom Mr. Barlow had sent away from the house on the morning of Agnes’s wedding. She felt bound, therefore, to follow her cousin, and she reached Brenda’s side just in time to hear her say, “But you must take something, for it was my fault that you came to the house.”

“Then buy a basket, Miss,—buy a basket,” said the woman; “that ’ll do.”

So Brenda, pulling out her purse, gave the woman