Kyzie shook her finger at both the boys and resolved that "Joe should stop calling names, and Henry should stop being such a cry-baby."
Annie Farrell was a dear little girl in a blue and white gingham gown, and the new teacher loved her at once. Dorothy Pratt was little more than a baby, and when spoken to she put her apron to her eyes and wanted to go home.
"She can't go home," said her older sister Janey, "mamma's cookin' for company!"
Kyzie patted the baby's tangled hair and sent Janey to get her some water.
"I'll go," spoke up Jack Whiting, aged seven. "Janey isn't big enough. Besides the pail leaks."
"I'm so glad Edith isn't here," thought Kyzie, "or we should both get to giggling. There, it's time now to call them out to read. Let me see, where is the best crack in the floor for them to stand on? Why didn't I bring a quarter of a dollar with a hole in it for a medal? Oh, the medal will be for the spelling-class; that was what Grandma Parlin said."
It seemed a "ling-long" forenoon, and the little teacher rejoiced when eleven o'clock came. The family at home looked at her curiously, and Uncle James asked outright, "Tell us, Grandmother Graymouse, how do the scholars behave?"
"Well, I suppose they behaved as well as they knew how; but oh, it makes me so hungry!"
She could not say whether she liked teaching or not.
"Wait till Friday night, Uncle James, and then I'll tell you."