The Bishop's Shadow

by I. T. Thurston

"We've made you a member of our circle, Nan, dear, and this is our badge."

And then Nan noticed that every one of the girls wore the tiny, silver cross somewhere about her dress. She wondered what it meant and determined to ask Mrs. Rawson later, but she could not talk much just then--she was too happy with all those dear girls about her, chattering to her and counting her in with themselves.

At last there was a rumble and a jar, and people began to fill up the seats in the car and one of the girls looked at her watch and exclaimed, "We must say 'good-bye' girls, or we shall be carried off."

"Wouldn't it be fun if we could all go too, and stay for the week with Mrs. Rawson?" cried another.

"Yes, indeed. If it weren't for school we might have done it."

"Now remember, Nan, we're all going to write to you because you belong to our circle," whispered another, and then, some with a kiss, and some with a warm handshake, they said, "good-bye," and hastened out of the car and stood on the platform outside the car windows, calling out more farewells and last words, and waving hands and handkerchiefs, until the train drew out of the station.

Then Nan settled back in her comfortable seat with a happy light in her dark eyes.

"I didn't suppose there were any such girls in all the world, Mrs. Rawson," she said; "girls who would be so dearly kind to a stranger like me."

"They certainly are dear girls. I think myself that there are not many like them," Mrs. Rawson answered. "Some of them have been in my Sunday-school class ever since they were nine years old."

"Perhaps that accounts for it," Nan answered, shyly, with one of her quick, bright smiles. Then she turned to look out of the window and her face changed, for there on a fence, close beside the track, stood Theodore, eagerly scanning the windows as the train went by. Nan snatched up Little Brother and held him to the window, and a smile broke over the boy's face as he waved his hat in response. Then the train gathered speed and flew on, and the boy went slowly back to his work.