inished out
her sentence with a sigh. She took up a little garment in dire straits
to be mended. It suggested things to the minister.

"Can Rhoda darn?"

"RHODA!"

"Or make sheets and bread and things?"

"Robert, don't you feel well? Where is the pain?" But the laugh in the
pleasant blue eyes died out suddenly. Little Rebecca Mary lay too heavy
on the minister's wife's heart for mirth.

Aunt Olivia went into Rebecca Mary's room in the middle of the night.
She had been in three times before.

"She looks thinner than she did last time," Aunt Olivia murmured,
distressedly. "Tomorrow night--how long do children live without eating?
It's four meals now--four meals is a great many for a little thin thing
to go without!" Aunt Olivia had been without four meals too; she would
have been able to judge how it felt--if she had remembered that part.
She stood in her scant, long nightgown, gazing down at the little
sleeper. The veil was down and her heart was in her eyes.

Rebecca Mary threw out her arm and sighed. "It LOOKS good, Thomas
Jefferson," she murmured. "When you're VERY hungry you can eat things
raw." Suddenly the child sat up in bed, wide-eyed and wild. She did not
seem to see Aunt Olivia at all.

"Once I ate a pie!" she cried. "It wasn't a whole one, but I should eat
a whole one now--I think I should eat the PLATE now." She swayed back
and forth weakly, awake and not awake.

"Once I ate a layer-cake. There was jam in it. I wouldn't care if it
was apple jelly in it now--I'd LIKE apple jelly in it now. Once I ate
a pudding and a doughnut a-n-d--a--a--I think it was a horse. I'd eat
a horse now. Hush! Don't tell Aunt Olivia, but I'm going to
eat--to--e-at--Thom-as--Jeffer--" She swayed back on the pillows again.
Aunt Olivia shook her in an agony of fear--she was so white--she lay so
still.

"Rebecca! Rebecca Mary! Rebecca Mary PLUMMER!" Aunt Olivia shrilled in
her ear. "You get right out o' bed this minute and come downstairs and
eat your supper! It's high time you had something in your stomach--I
don't care if it's twelve o'clock. You get right out o' bed REBECCA
MARY!"

Aunt Olivia had the limp little figure in her arms, shaking it gently
again and again. Rebecca's startled eyes flew open. In that instant was
born inspiration in the brain of Aunt Olivia. She thought of an appeal
to make.

"Do you want ME to starve, too? Right here before your face and eyes? I
haven't eat a mouthful since you did, and I sh