After some coaxing and prompting from what they already guessed, Mary told the story of her sad little life.
She was an orphan recently left to the care of her uncle and aunt, who had received her grudgingly. They were her sole relatives; and the shame of their degraded lives was plain through the outlines of the vague picture which Mary sketched of them.
"You do not love them, Mary?" asked Miss Terry kindly.
"No," answered the child. "They always speak crossly to me. When they have been drinking they beat me."
Tom rose from the table with a muttered word and began to pace the floor. His blue eyes were full of tears.
"Mary," said Miss Terry, "will the people at home be worried if you do not come back to dinner?"
Mary shook her head wonderingly. "No," she said. "They will not care. I am often away on holidays. I go to the Museums."
"Then I want you to stay with us to-day," said Miss Terry. "We are going to have a Christmas celebration, and we need you for a guest. Will you stay, you and Miranda?"
Mary looked down at the doll in her arms, and up at the two kind faces bent toward her. "Yes," she said impulsively, "I will stay. How good you are! I don't want to go home."
"Don't go home!" burst out Tom. "Stay with us always and be our little girl."