and a high-necked and long-sleeved gingham
apron.

"Take this seat, Alma," said Miss Joslyn; and the little girl obeyed, while
Ada Singer, the scholar directly behind her, nudged her friend, Lucy Berry,
and mimicked the stranger's surprised way of looking around the room.

The first day in a new school is an ordeal to most children, but Alma felt
no fear or strangeness, and gazed about her, well pleased with her novel
surroundings, and her innocent pleasure was a source of great amusement to
Ada.

"Isn't she queer-looking?" she asked of Lucy, as at noon they perched on
the window-sill in the dressing-room, where they always ate their lunch
together.

"Yes, she has such big eyes," assented Lucy. "Who is she?"

"Why, her mother has just come to work in my father's factory. Her father
is dead, or in prison, or something."

"Oh, no!" exclaimed a voice, and looking down from their elevated seat the
girls saw Alma Driscoll, a big tin dinner-pail in her hand, and her cheeks
flushing. "My father went away because he was discouraged, but he is coming
back."

Ada shrugged her shoulders and took a bite of jelly-cake. "What a delicate
appetite you must have," she said, winking at Lucy and looking at the big
pail.

"Oh, it isn't full; the things don't fit very well," replied Alma, taking
off the cover and disclosing a little lunch at the bottom; "but it was all
the pail we had." Then she sat down on the floor of the dressing-room and
took out a piece of bread and butter.

"Well, upon my word, if that isn't cool!" exclaimed Ada, staring at the
brown gingham figure.

Alma looked up mildly. She had come to the dressing-room on purpose to eat
her lunch where she could look at Lucy Berry, who seemed beautiful to Alma,
with her brown eyes, red cheeks, and soft cashmere dress, and it never
occurred to her that she could be in the way.

Ada turned to Lucy with a curling lip. "I should hate to be a third party,
shouldn't you?" she asked, so significantly that even Alma couldn't help
understanding her. Tears started to the big eyes as the little girl
dropped her bread back into the hollow depths of the pail, replaced the
cover, and went away to find a solitary corner, with a sorer spot in her
heart than she had ever known.

"Oh, why did you say that, Ada?" exclaimed Lucy, making a movement as if to
slip down from the window-seat and follow.

"Don't you go one step after her, Lucy Berry," commanded Ada. "My mother
doesn't wan