u like a vase, Judy?" asked Anne. "We have a nice red one
in the parlor."

Judy drew her shoulders together in a little shiver of distaste. "Oh,
no, no," she shuddered, "this bowl is such a beauty, Anne."

"But it is so old," said Anne, "it belonged to my great-grandmother."

"That is why it is so beautiful," said Judy, as she went out of the
door into the garden.

When she came in she had filled the bowl with yellow tulips, which, set
in the center of the table, seemed to radiate sunshine, and to glorify
the plain little room. "I should never have thought of the tulips,
Judy," exclaimed Anne, "but they look lovely."

There was such genuine admiration in the tender voice, that Judy looked
at Anne for the first time with interest--at the plain, straight figure
in the unfashionable blue gingham, at the freckled face, with its
tip-tilted nose, and at the fair hair hanging in two neat braids far
below the little girl's waist.

"Do you like to live here, Anne?" she asked, suddenly.

Anne, still bending over the tulips, lifted two surprised blue eyes.

"Of course," she said. "Of course I do, Judy."

"I hate it," said Judy. "I hate the country, Anne--"

And this time she did not express her dislike indifferently, but with a
swift straightening of her slender young body, and a nervous clasping
of her thin white fingers.

"I hate it," she said again.

Anne stood very still by the table. What could she say to this strange
girl who hated so many things, and who was staring out of the window
with drawn brows and compressed red lips?

"Perhaps I like it because it is my home," she said at last, gently.

Judy caught her breath quickly. "I am never going back to my home,
Anne," she said.

"Never, Judy?"

"No--grandfather says that I am to stay here with him--" There was
despair in the young voice.

Anne went over to the window. "Perhaps you will like it after awhile,"
she said, hopefully, "the Judge is such a dear."

"I know--" Judy's tone was stifled, "but he isn't--he isn't my
mother--Anne--"

For a few minutes there was silence, then Judy went on:

"You see I nursed mother all through her last illness. I was with her
every minute--and--and--I want her so--I want my mother--Anne--"

But so self-controlled was she, that though her voice broke and her
lips trembled, her eyes were dry. Anne reached out a plump, timid
hand, and laid it over the slender one on the window-sill.

"I haven't any mother