“Ask your ma to let you stay till half-past nine, will you?”

“Yes.”

“Good-by.”

“Good-by till dark,” replied Jessie, laughing at the idea of her friend bidding her good-by just for an hour.

Jessie now felt very strong in her purpose. She had resisted no less than four temptations to yield to her impulses in about an hour and a half. This was doing nobly, and Jessie felt more self-respect than she had ever felt before. She was certainly doing battle in real earnest with her old enemy, the little wizard, as Uncle Morris facetiously called him. And she had her reward for all her self-denial in the glad feelings which bubbled up in her heart like springs of water in some cosy mountain nook.

Nothing else came to tempt Jessie the remainder of that afternoon. She sewed until it was too dark to see in front of the fire; then she took her seat close to the window, and it was not until she could no longer see to take a stitch neatly that she began to put up her work.

“One more morning will finish it,” said she, after taking a glance at her work. “Oh! how glad I shall be when I have taken the last stitch. And won’t I be glad when it comes out of the quilting-frame, and is spread upon Uncle Morris’s bed. It’s been a long time doing—Oh! ever so long—thanks to the little wizard. But little wizard, little wizard, go away! go away! We don’t want you any longer in Glen Morris Cottage.”

In this cheerful mood Jessie tied on her hood and cloak, and tripped over to Carrie Sherwood’s, where she spent one of the pleasantest evenings she had enjoyed since the coming of her cousins to Duncanville. For some reasons unknown to me, it pleased that selfish brother and sister to put on their best and most approved behavior. Perhaps they caught a ray or two of the joy which beamed, like sunshine, from Jessie’s heart.

The next morning after breakfast, filled with the idea of finishing the quilt before dinner, Jessie found a parcel in her work-basket directed to Miss Jessie Carlton.

“What can it be?” said she, as she hastily untied the string, and unfolded the wrapping-paper.