Belle Powers' Locket

by Joanna H. Mathews

"I reckon it's not too fancy," said Daphne, holding up the locket and looking at it admiringly: "you may wear it if you like, and mebbe Miss Ashton would like to see it."

Now the locket was perhaps not quite a proper thing for Belle to wear to school, and had her father been there he might have advised her to keep to her first decision; but Daphne always liked to deck out her little lady in all the finery she could lay her hands on, and, had she not been held in check by wiser heads, would often have sent her forth to school in very improper guise. And as Mabel was always very much dressed, it chafed Daphne sorely to contrast the simple but more suitable garments of her little Miss Belle with the showy ones worn by her cousin.

So now she persuaded Belle to wear the locket, saying, not to the child, but to herself, that it "was time folks foun' out her folks was wort somethin', an' had plenty of pretty things if they on'y chose to show 'em;" and, rather against the child's own better judgment, she suffered the nurse to put the locket about her neck.

It was well for Belle, and for those who had the guiding of her, that she was such a docile little girl, generally willing and anxious to do that which she believed to be right, or she might have been sadly injured by the spoiling of her devoted but foolish old nurse. As it was, it did not do her much harm; and Daphne often felt herself put to shame by the little one's uprightness and good sense.

However, on this morning Daphne had her way; and, as I have said, the locket was put on.

As might have been supposed, the new ornament immediately attracted the attention of all Belle's class-mates; and they crowded about her before school opened, to examine and admire, with many an "oh!" and "ah!" "how lovely!" and "how sweet!"

"Mabel, have you one too?" asked Dora Johnson; for the children had found out by this time that if Belle had a pretty thing, Mabel was sure to have one also.

"I'm going to," said Mabel, "one just like it: you see if I don't; even if that cross-patch won't let the man have it to pattern off of. She thinks herself so great nobody can have a locket like hers."

"Belle's not a cross-patch," said Lily Norris; "and, Mabel, if you talk that way about her, we won't be friends with you, not any of the class. Belle's old in the class, and you're new; and we don't think so very much of you. So you'd better look out."

Mabel and Lily were always at swords' points; for Lily was saucy and outspoken, very fond of Belle, and always upholding her rights, or what she considered such.