ther has told me about things like that."

"In Italy, Zara?"

"Yes. We're not Italians, really, but that's where we lived."

"But you don't remember anything about that, do you?"

"No, but I've been told all about it. We used to live in a white house,
on a hillside. And there were lemon trees and olive trees growing there,
and all sorts of beautiful things. And you could look out over the blue
sea, and see the boats sailing, and away off there was a great
mountain."

"I should think you'd want to go back there, Zara. It must have been
beautiful."

"Oh, I've always wanted to see that place, Bessie. Sometimes, my father
says, the mountain, would smoke, and fire would come out of it, and the
ground would shake. But it never hurt the place where we lived."

"That must have been a volcano, Zara."

"Yes, that's what he used to call it."

"Why did you come over here?"

"Because my father was always afraid over there. There were some bad men
who hated him, and he said that if he stayed there they would hurt him.
And he heard that over here everyone was welcome, and one man was as
good as another. But he wasn't, or they never seemed to think so, if he
was."

Bessie looked very thoughtful.

"This is the finest country in the world, Zara," she said. "I've heard
that, and I've read it in books, too. But I guess that things go wrong
here sometimes. You see, it's this way. Just think of Jake Hoover."

"But I don't want to think about him! I want to forget him!"

"Well, Jake Hoover explains what I'm thinking about. He's an American,
but that isn't the reason he was so mean to us. He'd be mean anywhere,
no matter whether he was an American or what. He just can't help it. And
I think he'll get over it, anyhow."

"There you go, Bessie! He's made all this trouble for you, and you're
standing up for him already."

"No, I'm not. But what trouble has he made for me, Zara? I'm going to be
happier than I ever was back there in Hedgeville--and if it hadn't been
for him I'd still be there, and I'd be chopping wood or something right
now."

"But he didn't mean to make you happier, Bessie. He thought he could get
you punished for something he'd done."

"Well, I wasn't, so why should I be angry at him, Zara? Even if he did
mean to be nasty, he wasn't."

"But suppose he'd hurt you some way, without meaning to at all? Would
you be angry at him then for hurting you, when he didn't mean to do it?"

"Of course not--just because