is geography and going to work. He played his pranks no
more, and the term passed peaceably, under the mental guidance of the
little girl and the physical overlordship of the Swede boy.

* * * * *

ON the afternoon of the last day of school, when her pupils had said
their good-bys and were straying homeward laden with their books and
slates, the little girl stayed behind. And, sitting in the very place to
which in former years she had raised reverent eyes, she looked round the
building, every crack and corner of which had its memory.

On the bench by the door, close beside the leaky water-bucket, was the
same battered, greasy basin in which the neighbor woman's daughter had
placed a horse-hair one day, stoutly maintaining that in due time the
hair would miraculously turn into a worm.

The broken pointer reminded her of a certain fierce encounter when,
having confided to one of the Dutchman's seven that on the previous
Sunday the farm-house had partaken of a dish of canned frogs' legs, she
had been hailed in return as "Miss Chinaman," and the teacher had closed
the event by routing her tormentors.

She thought of the morning the Dutch children first came in leather
shoes, an occasion recalled by the pencil-marks behind the chart, where
she had stood her punishment for too much smiling.

The stove-poker brought back the terrible moment she had dared to put
her tongue against it in the icy school-room, and had had to sit with
the iron cleaving to her until the teacher warmed some water.

The peg above the coal-bins reminded her of the winter day when she
took down the well-rope and tied it to the faithful Luffree's collar, so
that, with his keener, finer instinct for direction, he could lead
teacher and pupils through a blizzard to the safety of the farm-house.

She was suddenly awakened from her day-dreams by the sound of galloping.
A horseman was approaching from the direction of the farm-house, and she
hurried to the door to see who it could be. As he came near, she ran out
joyfully to meet him. It was the colonel's son.

"They told me you were here," he cried, springing from his saddle. She
could scarcely answer him for sheer happiness, and when he brought out
her mount and they started away through the twilight, he leading the
horses, she walked beside him silently.

He told her about his trip, his months at the preparatory school, his
new friends, the wonders of the big city i