de that she guessed that
the children were really saving their pennies for the fair. This
delighted her.

The W.M.N.T.'s wasted no time that last week in spite of a very
enticing snowstorm. Maida, of course, had nothing to do on her own
account, but she worked with Dicky, morning and afternoon.

Rosie could not make candy until the last two or three days for fear
it would get stale. Then she set to like a little whirlwind.

"My face is almost tanned from bending over the stove," she said to
Maida; "Aunt Theresa says if I cook another batch of candy, I'll
have a crop of freckles."

Arthur seemed to work the hardest of all because his work was so
much more difficult. It took a great deal of time and strength and
yet nobody could help him in it. The sound of his hammering came
into Maida's room early in the morning. It came in sometimes late at
night when, cuddling between her blankets, she thought what a happy
girl she was.

"I niver saw such foine, busy little folks," Granny said approvingly
again and again. "It moinds me av me own Annie. Niver a moment but
that lass was working at some t'ing. Oh, I wonder what she's doun'
and finking this Christmas."

"Don't you worry," Maida always said. "Billy'll find her for you
yet--he said he would."

Maida, herself, was giving, for the first time in her experience, a
good deal of thought to Christmas time.

In the first place, she had sent the following invitation to every
child in Primrose Court:

"Will you please come to my Christmas Tree to be given Christmas
Night in the 'Little Shop.' Maida."

In the second place, she was spying on all her friends, listening to
their talk, watching them closely in work and play to find just the
right thing to give them.

"Do you know, I never made a Christmas present in my life," she said
one day to Rosie.

"You never made a Christmas present?" Rosie repeated.

Maida's quick perception sensed in Rosie's face an unspoken
accusation of selfishness.

"It wasn't because I didn't want to, Rosie dear," Maida hastened to
explain. "It was because I was too sick. You see, I was always in
bed. I was too weak to make anything and I could not go out and buy
presents as other children did. But people used to give me the
loveliest things."

"What did they give you?" Rosie asked curiously.

"Oh, all kinds of things. Father's given me an automobile and a pair
of Shetland ponies and a family of twenty dolls and my weight in
silve