Amarilly of Clothes-line Alley

"No; but she," with a wave of her hand toward the swiftly gliding

electric, "is agoin to help me git eddicated, and she has give me a

beautiful rug fer the Boarder, and we're agoin' to hev her waists to

wash, and Mr. St. Mark's clo'es, and she told all the scholars to sew

like me 'cause' I sewed the best, and I've larned how to set our table.

We mustn't stack up the knife and fork and spoon on ends any more. The

knife goes to the right, the fork to the left of the plate, and the

spoon goes back of it and the tumbler and the napkin, when you has 'em,

to the right."

"I do declare, Amarilly, if it ain't jest like a fairy story!" cried

Mrs. Jenkins enthusiastically. "You allers did strike luck."

"You bet!" cried Bobby admiringly. "Things go some where Amarilly is."

Amarilly was happier even than she had been on the night of the eventful

matinee day. The electric brougham had seemed a veritable fairy

godmother's coach to her. But it was not the ride that stood uppermost

in her memory as she lay awake far into the night; it was the little

word of endearment uttered in caressing cadence.

"No one ain't ever called me that afore," she murmured wistfully. "I

s'pose ma ain't hed time, and thar was no one else to keer."

Impulsively and tenderly her thin little arm encircled the baby sleeping

beside her.

"Dear!" she whispered in an awed tone. "Dear!"

Iry answered with a sleepy, cooing note.