she does come."

"Oh, no," said Phronsie, shaking her head soberly, and speaking in an
injured tone. "I'm not one bit tired, Polly; not one bit."

"You needn't go yet, Phronsie," said Polly. "You can sit up half an hour
yet, if you want to."

"But I don't want to go to bed at all," said the child anxiously, "for
then I may be asleep when mamsie comes, Polly."

"She's afraid she won't wake up," said Percy, laughing. "Oh, there'll be
oceans of time before they come, Phronsie."

"What is oceans," asked Phronsie, coming up and looking at him,
doubtfully.

"He means mamsie won't get here till afternoon," said Polly, catching
her up and kissing her; "then I guess you'll be awake, Phronsie, pet."

So Phronsie allowed herself to be persuaded, at the proper time, to be
carried off and inducted into her little nightgown. And when Polly went
up to bed, she found the little pin-cushion, with its hieroglyphics,
that she had insisted on taking to bed with her, still tightly grasped
in the little fat hand.

"She'll roll over and muss it," thought Polly; "and then she'll feel bad
in the morning. I guess I'd better lay it on the bureau."

So she drew it carefully away, without awaking the little sleeper, and
placed it where she knew Phronsie's eyes would rest on it the first
thing in the morning.

It was going on towards the middle of the night when Phronsie, whose
exciting dreams of mamsie and the boys wouldn't let her rest quietly,
woke up; and in the very first flash she thought of her cushion.

"Why, where--" she said, in the softest little tones, only half awake,
"why, Polly, where is it?" and she began to feel all around her pillow
to see if it had fallen down there.

But Polly's brown head with its crowd of anticipations and busy
plans was away off in dreamland, and she breathed on and on perfectly
motionless.

"I guess I better," said Phronsie to herself, now thoroughly awake, and
sitting up in bed, "not wake her up. Poor Polly's tired; I can find it
myself, I know I can."

So she slipped out of bed, and prowling around on the floor, felt all
about for the little cushion.

"'Tisn't here, oh, no, it isn't," she sighed at last, and getting up,
she stood still a moment, lost in thought. "Maybe Jane's put it out
in the hall," she said, as a bright thought struck her. "I can get it
there," and out she pattered over the soft carpet to the table at the
end of the long hall, where Jane often placed the children's play