"If you do not think hard you will have a heart that is a dark place, like the scrub-pail closet, and it will he hard to keep it clean of wrong thoughts, like the white mother talked about in Sunday-school. The motto means inside of us as well as places where we live. I like to think hard," said Cordelia Running Bird. "I heard the teacher tell the white mother that I had the best memory of any middle-sized girl, and she said it was as good as many white girls' memories of my age, and that is 'most fourteen. So I am to speak the longest middle-sized piece in the Christmas entertainment."
"Ee!" cried Hannah Straight Tree, "hear her brag because she has a white memory! If the teacher praised me, I should be ashamed to tell it!"
"She will not praise you, for you are always very dumb in school. You will not try to speak a lesson only with the class in concert," said Cordelia Running Bird. "I shall try to finish very fast this morning. There are only two more Saturdays till Christmas, and to-day I want to feather-stitch the little new blue dress for Susie. She will wear it every day when she is here Christmas. Many white and Indian visitors will be here."
"And you will feel so proud because the visitors and the school will look at Susie, and the middle-sized and little girls will always choose her in the games. They would not choose my little sister if she played," said Hannah Straight Tree, with a sudden downcast look.
"Dolly is so shy I do not know if she would go into the middle of the ring if they should choose her, and she would not know the way to choose back," answered Cordelia Running Bird.
"Ee! She would! She would!" disputed Hannah Straight Tree. "Dolly is as brave and smart as Susie—smarter, too, for she is shorter! She could play the games if I would let her!"
"But you will not," replied the other; "you must not scold about my little sister. Susie knows the motions in the Jack Frost song so well the teachers says that she can motion with the children in the Christmas entertainment."
"She does not motion right," said Hannah Straight Tree. "She gets behind, and when they sing:
"'He nips little children on the nose,
He pinches little children on the toes,
He pulls little children by the ears,
And brings to their eyes the big, round tears,'
she is only nipping her nose when the rest are pulling their ears."