"Out West?" repeated Mrs. Eland.
"Yes, ma'am. Miss Lippit says that isn't her real name. She was a 'dopted child."
"Who was?" demanded the matron, all in a flutter again.
"Miss Pepperill. She was brought up by a family named Pepperill. Seems funny," said Tess, gravely. "She lost her mother and father in a fire."
"I guess that's why her hair is red," said Dot, not believing her own reasoning, but desiring to be in the conversation.
Mrs. Eland was silent for some minutes. "She isn't mad, is she?" whispered Dot to Tess.
But the latter respected her friend's silence. Finally the matron said pleasantly enough: "I am going out when you children go home. You must show me where this school teacher of yours lives. If I can be of any service——"
She put on her bonnet and the long gray cloak in a few minutes, and the three set forth from the hospital. Dot clung to one hand and Tess to the other of the little gray woman, as they went to Miss Lippit's boarding house.
"This is Mrs. Eland," Tess said to the spinster, who was both landlady and friend of the injured school teacher. "She is my friend and the matron of the hospital where Miss Pepperill went with us one day."
"When she carried my flowers and gave some to the children," muttered Dot, who had never gotten over that.