when you are
ready for me to open my eyes."

The carriage bowled along over new and smoother roads. Gloria was
conscious that it was making several turns.

"One!" Uncle Em said, and Gloria drew in whiffs of warm September air.

"Two!"

Gloria was sure she heard a bird singing--of course, in a tree. "Hurry,
hurry!" she said. "Say 'Three,' Uncle Em!"

"Th-ree!"

It was, after all, not much more than a hole in a wide stretch of green
grass, with an uneven wall of bricks defining the excavation. But it was
the beginning! The beginning!

And trees were dropping gold leaves down upon the men as they worked.
The little singing bird was in one of the trees.

"Oh!" murmured Gloria, shutting her eyes again, "I can see better with
my eyes shut! I can see a beautiful big house, Uncle Em--my house! It's
straight and whole and--_happy_. I can see Rose and Hunkie at one of the
windows and Sal coming down the stairs. 'Miss Districk,' you're there,
too. And Dinney, don't you see, is playing on the grass!"

Mary Winship laughed a sweet, indulgent laugh.

"Yes, I see all of it, Gloria, just as you do." She was gazing with the
eyes of faith at the small beginning of Gloria's model tenement house.
But gentle, prosaic Aunt Em saw only the hole in the ground and the
untidy litter around it.

"I guess we've seen it all," Aunt Em said. "I'm afraid Gloria will get
too tired, Walter. Oughtn't we to go home now?"

"In a minute, dear Aunt Em. Just a little minute more!" pleaded Gloria.
"I want to take another look--it's such a beautiful house!"

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Gloria and Treeless Street
by Annie Hamilton Donnell

*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GLORIA AND TREELESS STREET ***

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