"Isn't he good to you?" Marigold questioned.
"Oh, I suppose so. Yes. He gives me plenty of money, and when he comes home he brings me presents; but—well, I often think I should be better pleased if he loved me a little more."
"Oh, but surely he loves you!"
"I don't believe he does: He never wants to have me with him, or cares anything about what I do!" Muriel said, with a sigh that sounded genuinely regretful.
Marigold, whose home, in spite of its poverty, had always been rich in affection, looked at her companion with her dark eyes full of sympathy. Muriel noted the look, and somehow it touched a soft part of her selfish little heart, and she said, speaking hurriedly—
"What made you help me to-day? I wouldn't have done it, if you'd been in my place."
Marigold made no answer. She blushed rosy red and turned her head aside.
"Didn't you feel glad to see me crying?"
"No, indeed I did not!"
"Don't you hate me for having spoken of your mother to the other girls as I did?"