to stay with us, you must tell
the truth and drop all sly ways."

"That's what he said when I first come."

"I say it too. You see a good deal, Jane. Try to see what will please
people instead of what you can find out about them. It's a much better
plan. Now, as a friend, I tell you of one thing you had better not do.
You shouldn't watch and listen to Mr. Holcroft unless he speaks to you.
He doesn't like to be watched--no one does. It isn't nice; and if you
come to us, I think you will try to do what is nice. Am I not right?"

"I dunno how," said Jane.

"It will be part of my business to teach you. You ought to understand
all about your coming. Mr. Holcroft doesn't take you because he needs
your work, but because he's sorry for you, and wishes to give you a
chance to do better and learn something. You must make up your mind to
lessons, and learning to talk and act nicely, as well as to do such
work as is given you. Are you willing to do what I say and mind me
pleasantly and promptly?"

Jane looked askance at the speaker and was vaguely suspicious of some
trick. In her previous sojourn at the farmhouse she had concluded that
it was her best policy to keep in Holcroft's good graces, even though
she had to defy her mother and Mrs. Wiggins, and she was now by no
means ready to commit herself to this new domestic power. She had
received the impression that the authority and continued residence of
females in this household was involved in much uncertainty, and
although Alida was in favor now and the farmer's wife, she didn't know
what "vicissitudes" (as her mother would denominate them) might occur.
Holcroft was the only fixed and certain quantity in her troubled
thoughts, and after a little hesitation she replied, "I'll do what he
says; I'm goin' to mind him."

"Suppose he tells you to mind me?"

"Then I will. That ud be mindin' him. I'm goin' to stick to him, for
I made out by it better before than by mindin' mother and Mrs. Wiggins."

Alida now understood the child and laughed aloud. "You are right," she
said. "I won't ask you to do anything contrary to his wishes. Now tell
me, Jane, what other clothes have you besides those you are wearing?"

It did not take the girl long to inventory her scanty wardrobe, and
then Alida rapidly made out a list of what was needed immediately.
"Wait here," she said, and putting on a pretty straw hat, one of her
recent purchases, she started for the barn.

Holcroft