Susie Morris fared no better. Susie was round and pink and pleasant. Everybody liked Susie. Several times she had walked home with Jeanne; but they had always parted at the gate.
"Do come in," pleaded Jeanne. "I'll show you my new party dress. It's for the dancing school party; next week, you know."
The dress was lovely. Susie admired it in her shrill, piping voice. The sound of it brought Mrs. Huntington down the hall to inspect the intruder.
"Jeannette," she asked, "who _is_ this child?"
"Where do you live!" asked Mrs. Huntington.
Mrs. Huntington shuddered again. _Another_ child from that horrible street! A blind child could have seen that she was unwelcome. Susie, who was far from blind, stayed only long enough to say good-by to Jeanne.
"You must be more careful," said Mrs. Huntington, "in your choice of friends."
"Everybody likes Susie," returned Jeanne, loyally.
"Her people are common," explained Mrs. Huntington. "I should be _glad_ to have you bring Lydia Coleman or Ethel Bailey home with you."
"There isn't a bit of fun in them," declared Jeanne, blushing because their resemblance to her cousins was her real reason for disliking them.
"Well, there's Cora Farnsworth. Surely there's plenty of fun in Cora."
"I don't like Cora, either. She says mean things just to _be_ funny," explained Jeanne, who had often suffered from Cora's "fun." "I don't like that kind of girls."
"Lydia, Ethel, and Cora live _on the Avenue_," returned Mrs. Huntington. "You _ought_ to like them. At any rate, you must bring no more East Side children home with you. I can't have them in my house."
Mrs. Huntington always talked about the Avenue as Bridget, who was very religious, talked of heaven. When their ship came in, Mrs. Huntington said, they should have a home in the Avenue. The old house they were in, she said, was quite impossible. Old Mr. Huntington, Jeanne gathered, did not wish to move to the more fashionable street.
Jeanne wondered about that ship of Aunt Agatha's. The river--she had seen it once--was a small, muddy affair. Surely no ship that could sail up that shallow stream would be worth waiting for. She asked her grandfather about it.
Her grandfather frowned. "We won't talk about that ship," said he. "I don't like it!"