.. but the man laid down a nickel, took
two doughnuts, and turned away. Betsy gasped and looked at the home-made
sign stuck into the big pan of doughnuts. Sure enough, it read "2 for
5." She put the nickel up on a shelf and went back to her dishwashing.
Selling things wasn't so hard, she reflected.
As her hunted feeling of desperation relaxed she began to find some fun
in her new situation, and when a woman with two little boys approached
she came forward to wait on her, elated, important. "Two for five," she
said in a businesslike tone. The woman put down a dime, took up four
doughnuts, divided them between her sons, and departed.
[Illustration: Never were dishes washed better!]
"My!" said Molly, looking admiringly at Betsy's coolness over this
transaction. Betsy went back to her dishes, stepping high.
"Oh, Betsy, see! The pig! The big ox!" cried Molly now, looking from her
coign of vantage down the wide, grass-grown lane between the booths.
Betsy craned her head around over her shoulder, continuing
conscientiously to wash and wipe the dishes. The prize stock was being
paraded around the Fair; the great prize ox, his shining horns tipped
with blue rosettes; the prize cows, with wreaths around their necks; the
prize horses, four or five of them as glossy as satin, curving their
bright, strong necks and stepping as though on eggs, their manes and
tails braided with bright ribbon; and then, "Oh, Betsy, LOOK at the
pig!" screamed Molly again--the smaller animals, the sheep, the calves,
the colts, and the pig, which waddled along with portly dignity.
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