During these five years of daily companionship Miss Julia has been unconsciously training Courage to be just such another noble woman as she is herself, and so they have been constantly growing nearer and still nearer to each other, if that were possible. They love the same books, they enjoy the same things, and now that regular school-life is over for Courage, they have the happiest sort of time together, day in and day out. Often, indeed, they have a very merry time of it, largely accounted for by the fact that Courage, being well and strong, as well as young, is often brimming over with a contagious buoyancy, sometimes called animal spirits, but to my thinking, it deserves a better name than that.
Everywhere that Miss Julia goes Courage goes too that is, if she is wanted (and seldom is she not), and one of the places where they go most frequently, and never empty-handed, is to a great hospital, where, since little lame Joe died, Mary Duff has become one of the sisters who give their lives to caring for sick children.
Courage even has a class next to Miss Julia's in the sewing-school where she used to be a scholar. Now and then she feels some little finger pointing at her, and knows well enough what is being said. One Saturday afternoon, when on her way to the chapel, she noticed two rather unkempt little specimens in close conference. “Yes, that's her,” she heard the smaller girl exclaim as she neared them, “and ain't she sweet and stylish! Well, she used to belong down here somewhere, but now she lives in a beautiful house with Miss Julia in Washington Square.”
“Like as not she didn't do nothin' to deserve it, either,” said the larger girl enviously, with a sullen shrug of her shoulders.
“Didn't do nothin'? Well, perhaps you don't know that she just saved Miss Julia's life; that's something, ain't it?” And with the color mantling forehead and cheeks Courage hurried on, grateful for the championship of her unknown little friend.
