"Oh, dear!" sighed the first. "I'd ought to a done it!"
"I don't think she would take a young girl like you," replied her friend.
"That's the way it always is!" exclaimed the disappointed voice, in forgetfulness and excitement uttering itself aloud. "Plenty of good times going, but they all go right by. I ain't never in any of 'em!"
"Glory McWhirk!" chided the directress, "be quiet! Remember the rules, or leave the room."
"Call that red-headed girl to me," said Miss Henderson, turning square round from the dirty figure that was presenting itself before her, and addressing the desk. "She looks clean and bright," she added, aside, to Faith, as Glory timidly approached. "And poor. And longing for a chance. I'll have her."
A girl with a bonnet full of braids and roses, and a look of general knowingness, started up close at Miss Henderson's side, and interposed.
"Did you say twenty miles, mum? How often could I come to town?"
"You haven't been asked to go out of town, that I know of," replied Miss Henderson, frigidly, abashing the office habitué, who had not been used to find her catechism cut so summarily short, and moving aside to speak with Glory.
"What was it I heard you say just now?"
"I didn't mean to speak out so, mum. It was only what I mostly thinks. That there's always lots of good times in the world, only I ain't never in 'em."