ance
would be cancelled.

The class was all in confusion. 'Fold arms!' cried the teacher
sharply, and the girls sat up rigidly. Bloomah obeyed instinctively
with the rest.

'Bloomah Beckenstein, do you want me to pull you out by your plait?'

'Mrs. Beckenstein, really you mustn't come here like that!' said the
teacher in her most ladylike accents.

'Tell Bloomah that,' answered Mrs. Beckenstein, unimpressed. 'She's
come here by runnin' away from home. There's nobody but her to see to
things, for we are all broken in our bones from dancin' at a weddin'
last night, and comin' home at four in the mornin', and pourin' cats
and dogs. If you go to our house, please, teacher, you'll see my Benjy
in bed; he's given up his day's work; he must have his sleep; he earns
three pounds a week as head cutter at S. Cohn's--he can afford to be
in bed, thank God! So now, then, Bloomah Beckenstein! Don't they teach
you here: "Honour thy father and thy mother"?'

Poor Bloomah rose, feeling vaguely that fathers and mothers should not
dishonour their children. With hanging head she moved to the door, and
burst into a passion of tears as soon as she got outside.

After, if not in consequence of, this behaviour, Mrs. Beckenstein
broke her leg, and lay for weeks with the limb cased in
plaster-of-Paris. That finished the chances of the Banner for a long
time. Between nursing and house management Bloomah could scarcely ever
put in an attendance.

So heavily did her twin troubles weigh upon the sensitive child day
and night that she walked almost with a limp, and dreamed of her name
in the register with ominous rows of black ciphers; they stretched on
and on to infinity--in vain did she turn page after page in the hope
of a red mark; the little black eggs became larger and larger, till at
last horrid horned insects began to creep from them and scramble all
over her, and she woke with creeping flesh. Sometimes she lay swathed
and choking in the coils of a Black Banner.

And, to add to these worries, the School Board officer hovered and
buzzed around, threatening summonses.

But at last she was able to escape to her beloved school. The expected
scowl of the room was changed to a sigh of relief; extremes meet, and
her absence had been so prolonged that reproach was turned to welcome.

Bloomah remorsefully redoubled her exertions. The hope of the Banner
flamed anew in every breast. But the other classes were no less keen;
a fifth standard,