“You know Poll always says that whenever we bring a stranger into the schoolroom,” said Nora. “But come, Kitty; let us wash our hands and get ready for supper. I suppose we’ll like her after a bit—although I’m not sure.”
“Did you notice the doll she had in her arms? Was it not too funny?” said Kitty.
“I expect she loves it,” said Nora, “but she won’t do so for long; we gave up dolls when we were ever so young. A doll is no fun when you have got a live thing to pet.”
At this juncture Nora rushed to Sally’s basket, took Jack from his mother, and clasped him tight in her arms.
“Oh! is he not just an angel?” she said; and then the little girls went to their room to get ready for supper.
Nan appeared, just as pale and just as unsmiling, in the schoolroom after she had submitted to nurse’s ministrations. She hated the bright fires and the gay lamp and the comforts.
“It is all charity,” she thought.
That afternoon she had questioned Phoebe as to the position of a girl whose mother had died without leaving any money behind; and Phoebe, who had no idea that her remarks would have any personal meaning, had said at once:
“Why, she is nothing in the world but a girl, miss; I’d not like to be her—that I wouldn’t.”
So Nan stood now with a bitter smile on her face. But as she stood alone in the schoolroom, looking wistfully about her, and wondering how she was to please her mother, and how by any possibility she could ever be the best girl whom Mr. Pryor spoke about, there came a funny little yap, and behold! Jack the bull-pup was at her feet.