Mrs. Pomeroy noticed the additional color, but supposing it to be caused by the suddenness of her question, she went on,—
"I am very much afraid she will never see it again, as the wind was so high last night, but I hope you will all keep watch, and if any one is so fortunate as to find it, she will bring it directly to me."
Mrs. Pomeroy then made some general remarks upon the evil effect of carelessness, and having dismissed the young ladies to their several employments, she returned to her own room to comfort Kitty, whom she considered to have been already sufficiently punished by the loss of her treasure.
"I should not mind it so much," said the poor little thing amid her sobs, "though I did want to give some presents this Christmas, if I had not been so naughty about it. You told me to put it away carefully, but I was in such a hurry to go out—"
A fresh burst of sobs brought on a terrible fit of coughing, which lasted so long that Mrs. Pomeroy became seriously alarmed and almost feared she would never breathe again. When at last the paroxysm had worn itself out, she was so much exhausted that the only thing to be done was to put her to bed, and keep her as quiet as possible. Such was the termination of the day to which Kitty had looked forward with so much pleasure only the night before.
But Kitty was a docile little creature, and had a wonderfully patient spirit, and before long, she was amusing herself placidly with a story book, and with her dear friends the old cat and her two kittens, which she was allowed as a special favor to have on the bed; while only an occasional quiver of the lip, and a sigh which seemed to come from the very depths of her heart, showed when the loss of her treasure returned to her mind.
Recess came at last to unloose the tongues in the school-room. Of course Kitty's misfortune was the subject of general conversation.
"Mrs. Pomeroy has often told Kitty that it would take some sharp lesson to cure her carelessness," remarked one of the girls; "and she has certainly got it now. I don't believe she will ever do such a thing again."
"I am afraid she will not live to do much more of any thing," said Lucy Spencer, sadly. "She looks so like my little sister that it seems sometimes as if it must be Anne herself. She had just such a cough for a year before she died, and her skin had that clear, waxy look that Kitty's has. I do not believe she will ever live to grow up."
"After all, perhaps it will be as well for her if she does not," remarked one of the elder scholars, a sad and depressed looking girl. "It is a miserable thing for a girl to be dependent upon strangers."