when she went she learned
that the child had been taken away by a rich lady and sent to a
hospital. This was all the people she saw knew. She did not see Mrs.
O'Meath.

VIII.

As soon as Molly could be moved she was taken from the hospital out to
Mildred's country home. She had pined so to see the country that the
doctors said it might start her towards recovery and would certainly do
her good. So Mildred's mother had closed her town house earlier than
usual and moved out before Easter.

From the very beginning it seemed to do her good. The fresh air and
sunshine; the trees just putting on their spring apparel; the tender
green grass; the flowers, and the orchards filled with bloom, all
entranced her and invigorated her. She loved to be out of doors, to
lie and look at the blue sky, with the great white clouds sailing away
up in it (she said they were great snow islands that floated about in
the blue air), and to listen to the songs of the birds flitting about
in the shrubbery and trees. She said she felt just as that mocking
bird must have done that day when he stood in the warm sunshine and saw
the blue sky above him when he got out of prison. Mildred used to take
her playthings and stay with her, and read to her out of her story
books, whilst Roy would lie around and look lazy and contented. There
was no place where he loved to sleep so well as on Molly's couch,
snuggled up against her.

One afternoon she was lying on her couch out in the yard. Mildred was
sitting by her, and Roy was asleep against her arm. It was Easter
Sunday, and everything was unusually quiet and peaceful. There had
been a good deal of talk about Easter. Molly did not know what Easter
was, and she had been wondering all day. Mildred herself had mentioned
it several times. She had a beautiful new dress, and Mrs. Johnson, the
lady who had given her the mocking bird, and for whom her mother had
gotten a place, had made it. Still to Molly's mind this was not all
that Easter meant. Molly had heard something about somebody coming
back from the dead. This had set her to thinking all day. She knew
about Sunday, because that day people did not go to work as on other
days; and could not go into the barroom by the front door, and some of
them went to church. But Easter was different. Something strange was
to happen. But nothing had happened. Mildred had been to church with
her mother; but no one had come. Even the poor la