er you fear!" cried Polly. "You'll see me so much, now I know
you want me, you won't get time for anything!"

"I'll risk it." Miss Twining nodded with emphasis.

"I've wondered sometimes," Polly went on, "what I would do if I had
to stay alone as much as some folks do--the ladies here, for
instance. Of course you can visit each other."

"Yes, except in the hours when it is forbidden."

"Strange, they won't let you go to see each other in the evening."

"I think it is because the ladies used to stay upstairs visiting
instead of going down to hear Mrs. Nobbs read. Not all of them are
educated up to science and history and such things."

"I should think they would have some good books in the library,
story books. Such a dry-looking lot I never saw!"

Miss Twining smiled. "They say that one night when Mrs. Nobbs was
reading 'History of the Middle Ages,' she went into the parlor to
find only two listeners, and right after that the rule was made
forbidding them to go to each other's rooms."

Polly shook her head laughingly. "That was pretty hard on Mrs.
Nobbs, wasn't it? Is she a good reader?"

Miss Twining gave a little shrug. "I don't go down usually," she
answered.

"Too bad! I don't wonder you are lonely. But you can read, can't
you?"

"Not much by this light. It is too high."

Polly regarded it with dissatisfaction.

"Yes, it is. I wish you had one on the table. They ought to give
you good lights."

Miss Twining pinched up her pretty lips with a thumb and
forefinger, but said nothing.

"I was so indignant to think they took that money from you that you
earned for writing a poem, I haven't got over it yet!"

"It did seem too bad," Miss Twining sighed.

"It was the meanest thing!" frowned Polly.

"For a long time I had not been in the spirit of writing, but that
day I just had to write those verses, and when the paper accepted
them it seemed to give me strength and courage and pleasure all at
once. I was so happy that morning, thinking I could earn enough to
buy me little things I want and perhaps some new books besides."

"I've felt like crying about it ever since," said Polly sadly.
"You have written a good deal, haven't you?"

"Oh, yes! When I was at home with father and mother I wrote nearly
every day. I had a book published," she added a little shyly.

"You did! That must be lovely--to publish a book!" Polly beamed
brightly on the little woman in the rocker.

"Yes, it wa