leam of precious
china made her think for a little while that she must be in a store.
She had never seen anything like this except in a store, when she
had been with her mother to buy a lamp-chimney. So she decided this
to be a store, but she said nothing. She did not speak at all, but
she ate her biscuits, and slice of breast of chicken, and
sponge-cake, and drank her milk.

She had her milk in a little silver cup which seemed as if it might
have belonged to another child; she also sat in a small high-chair,
which made it seem as if another child had lived or visited in the
house. Ellen became singularly possessed with this sense of the
presence of a child, and when the door opened she would look around
for her to enter, but it was always an old black woman with a face
of imperturbable bronze, which caused her to huddle closer into her
chair when she drew near.

There were not many colored people in the city, and Ellen had never
seen any except at Long Beach, where she had sometimes gone to have
a shore dinner with her mother and Aunt Eva. Then she always used to
shrink when the black waiter drew near, and her mother and aunt
would be convulsed with furtive mirth. "See the little gump," her
mother would say in the tenderest tone, and look about to see if
others at the other tables saw how cunning she was--what a charming
little goose to be afraid of a colored waiter.

Ellen saw nobody except the lady and the black woman, but she was
still sure that there was a child in the house, and after supper,
when she was taken up-stairs to bed, she peeped through every open
door with the expectation of seeing her.

But she was so weary and sleepy that her curiosity and capacity for
any other emotion was blunted. She had become simply a little,
tired, sleepy animal. She let herself be undressed; she was not even
moved to much self-pity when the lady discovered the cruel bruise on
her delicate knee, and kissed it, and dressed it with a healing
salve. She was put into a little night-gown which she knew dreamily
belonged to that other child, and was laid in a little bedstead
which she noted to be made of gold, with floating lace over the
head.

She sleepily noted, too, that there were flowers on the walls, and
more floating lace over the bureau. This room did not look so
strange to her as the others; she had somehow from the treasures of
her fancy provided the family of big bears and little bears with a
similar one. Then, too