Or sometimes she will draw aside the window-curtains and say:
"Look at the stars, mother.... Don't you think we get the best view of them down here?"
So it is that Margaret persuades her mother to delay her journey a little while.
Kittie's Sister Josephine
by Elizabeth Jordan
Kittie James told me this story about her sister Josephine, and when she saw my eye light up the way the true artist's does when he hears a good plot, she said I might use it, if I liked, the next time I "practised literature."
I don't think that was a very nice way to say it, especially when one remembers that Sister Irmingarde read three of my stories to the class in four months; and as I only write one every week, you can see yourself what a good average that was. But it takes noble souls to be humble in the presence of the gifted, and enthusiastic over their success, so only two of my classmates seemed really happy when Sister Irmingarde read my third story aloud. It is hardly necessary to mention the names of these beautiful natures, already so well known to my readers, but I will do it. They were Maudie Joyce and Mabel Blossom, and they are my dearest friends at St. Catharine's. And some day, when I am a real writer and the name of May Iverson shines in gold letters on the tablets of fame, I'll write a book and dedicate it to them. Then, indeed, they will be glad they knew me in my schoolgirl days, and recognized real merit when they saw it, and did not mind the queer things my artistic temperament often makes me do. Oh, what a slave is one to this artistic, emotional nature, and how unhappy, how misunderstood! I don't mean that I am unhappy all the time, of course, but I have Moods. And when I have them life seems so hollow, so empty, so terrible! At such times natures that do not understand me are apt to make mistakes, the way Sister Irmingarde did when she thought I had nervous dyspepsia and made me walk three miles every day, when it was just Soul that was the matter with me. Still, I must admit the exercise helped me. It is so soothing, so restful, so calming to walk on dear nature's breast. Maudie Joyce and Mabel Blossom always know the minute an attack of artistic temperament begins in me. Then they go away quietly and reverently, and I write a story and feel better.