Bella sat stiffly as the chatter of four strange girls rattled around her ears. Her forehead creased in thought as she looked from face to face without recognization. Save one, after staring at one that half-reclined on a battered, worn-out old couch, she realized that she knew that one. It was her twin, Ella. She didn't know much else about her. But at least she knew her name.

Bt even as she thought that memories of her twin started unfolding in her mind, making her dizzy again with the speed of the information needing processing. She rubbed her head and pulled her attention to the conversation instead of letting her mind dwell on the madness inside. There lies misery. Besides, if she focused, she will pick up clues that will help her to figure out what is going on. "If you let yourself panic." She told herself sternly, "Then you will be unable to deal with anything. So stay calm."

Still, she was grateful that she al least now know her own name. Bella. Bella March.

So, taking a deep breath, she composed her features, thankfully before anyone else seemed to notice, and listened as the girls continued to chatter.

Minutes passed, and she began to develop a base of information to go on. It looks like the strange girls were also her sisters.

"Mother didn't say anything about our money. She won't wish for us to give up everything. Let's each buy something we want and have a little fun. I'm sure we work hard enough to earn it. Cried the first speaker in a way that Bella decided was rather decided and forceful. Had they money? It appeared so. She quietly felt along the side of her dress and found a pocket. Slipping her hand in, she pulled out a single bit of money. One dollar?

"I know I do! Teaching those tiresome children nearly all day when I'm longing to enjoy myself at home!" The oldest-looking girl said, in a decidedly whiny tone, but the one on the floor cut her off by exclaiming. "You don't have half such a hard time as I do. How would you like to be shut up for hours with a nervous, fussy old lady who keeps you trotting, is never satisfied, and worries you until you are ready to fly out the window or cry!"
Oh dear! Bella thought to herself as she glanced from one girl to the other. How horrible! For a moment, she froze in sudden panic as she wondered what horrible fate waited for her. Then the brown-haired girl near the fireplace spoke up, looking at the other shyly with a wistful yet mournful expression on her round, rosy face before looking at her hands, which were red and work-worn. "It's naughty to fret, but I do think washing dishes and keeping things tidy is the worst work in the world. It makes me cross and my hands get so stiff, I can't practice well at all."

"I don't believe the rest of you suffer as I do." Cried the blond indignantly. "For you don't have to go to school with impertinent girls who plague you if you don't know your lessons and label your father when he isn't rich and insult you when your nose isn't nice."
Something in the young blond's rant jolted a memory of Bella's long hours poring over books in a single room with row after row of desks and girls, while a man in the front ranted and commanded and called classes up to recite. It was a vague picture, but it felt right, and she surprised herself by speaking up. "I go to that same school, as you do." She said in a tone that sounded a little distant in her own ears. "If you study as hard as I do and you should then you wouldn't be teased so much for not knowing your lessons. As for the rest, they don't mean much. And it's Libel, not label."

"I would be teased, only I would be called a bluestocking, like you!" The girl shot back in a way that made Bella color up to her hairline, though she hadn't a clue what a bluestocking was.

"If you mean libel, then say so and don't talk about labels as though Father was a pickle bottle!" added the lounging one contemptuously, with a little laugh.
"I know what I mean, and you needn't get statirical about it. It is proper to use good words and improve your vocibilary." the blond said with dignity.

"It would help your vocabulary better to pronounce your words correctly." Bella snapped, flinching at the new blunders.

"Don't peck at each other, girls. Don't you wish we had the money Papa lost when we were little Jo? Dear me! How happy and good we will be if we had no worries!"

"You said the other day you thought we were a deal happier than the King children, for they were fighting and fretting all the time, in spite of their money."
"So I did, Beth. Well, I think we are, for though we do have to work, we mane fun for ourselves and are a pretty jolly set, as Jo would say."

So, Belle mused to herself, as she continued to listen to the girls. Jo was the one laying down on the rug. Beth was the one sweeping the hearth. She thought it was called the hearth, anyway. Well, at least two more had names. Then the blond distracted her with the pointed observation as she stared at the one lying on the rug. No, at Jo. Use the names. "Jo does use such slang words."
This caused the lone figure…..Jo, to sit up, put her hands in the pockets of her skirts and began to whistle like a musical, out-of-tune bird.

"Don't Jo! That's so boyish!"

"That's why I do it."
"I detest rude, unladylike girls!"
"I hate affected niminy-piminy chits!"

"Must you be so loud!" Ella complained just as loudly and angrily from the other side of the room as she turned toward them, rubbing her head in a fretful way. "My head aches from all your racket."

"So sorry to bother you, Miss Vanity." Jo snapped back. "I get sick from watching you preen and prick in front of that mirror so much!"
"Birds in their little nest agree." Beth sang out, with a funny prim expression on her face that made the others laugh as one.