, who had
been lying very still, suddenly said--

"I have been dreaming of Jack again--Jack Harrison. I think he must be
coming home."

"Did you care for Jack Harrison very much?"

"Very much," said Joy; "he was always so good to me. That last day
before he ran away he lent me that pretty book you were looking at, and
said we would learn those verses at the beginning together, and I never
saw him again. That was a dreadfully sad time; and then, not content
with being very hard on Jack, Miss Pinckney and your uncle said he was
a thief. Think of that! Jack a thief! Miss Pinckney said he had got
the key of a drawer and taken out a little box, where she kept the
money. There were four or five pounds in it."

"A box!" Bet said; "was it a big box?"

"Oh no; dear Goody says it would go into anybody's pocket. A little
box with a padlock and a little key. I knew Jack did not take it, but
of course as he ran away that very day it looks _like_ it. Even Susan
shakes her head, and I never talk of Jack to her. But," said Joy, "I
am tired now, and I think I'll take what Uncle Bobo calls 'forty
winks.'"

Everything was very quiet after that; and when Bet saw Joy was asleep,
she crept downstairs, and in the shop saw Mrs. Harrison.

Miss Pinckney's shutters were closed, and she felt free to come over
and have a last look at Joy.

"A little box! a little box!" Bet repeated to herself as she went home.
"A box so small it would go into anybody's pocket." And Bet that night
lay awake pondering many things, and repeating very often, "A little
box!"

CHAPTER XI.

_MR. SKINNER IN COMMAND._

Mrs. Skinner was more silent than ever during the next few days, and
when she spoke it was to scold Bet in a rasping voice.

She was suffering from that very bad mental disease which is beyond the
reach of doctors, and is a perpetual torment; and that disease is
called remorse.

Of late she had been haunted by the memory of her only daughter, and of
her harshness to her. The man she had chosen to marry was good, and to
all appearance above the class in which Maggie was born. There was
nothing against him but poverty. He had been a travelling
photographer, who set up his little van with "Photographic Studio"
painted on the canvas cover in large letters, and had sometimes done a
brisk trade on Yarmouth sands. One of his first customers had been
Maggie Skinner, then in her fresh beauty, and a tempting subject for a
photo