"If you won't cry any more, Polly, I'll get Martha"--Martha was the
chambermaid--"to show you _her_ valentine; it's a beauty."

Polly dropped her apron and began to swallow her sobs, while Jane ran to
Martha, who was very proud of her valentine, and very glad to show it
even to little Polly Price; and the valentine _was_ a beauty, as Jane
had said. Polly, looking through the tears that still hung on her
lashes at the group of little cherubs that were dancing out of lily-cups
and roses, cried, "Angels, angels!" winding up with, "Oh, I _wish_
somebody 'd send me a valentine!"

"She didn't know a thing about valentines; never heard of them till just
now," Jane explained to Martha.

"Well, to be sure," said Martha, "she is the greenest little thing; but
then she ain't never been to school like the rest of ye, and things is
very quiet and out-of-the-way like in the Home here, and she's nothin'
but a baby."

"I ain't a baby! I ain't, I ain't!" screamed Polly.

"Polly, Polly!" warned Jane. But Polly only burst out afresh in loud
sobs and cries. Jane was a good-natured girl, but she could not stand
this, and, reaching forward, she gave Polly a little shake, and said,
"Now, Polly Price, you just stop and be a good girl, or I'll never have
anything more to do with you."

Polly gasped. Three years ago, when she was first brought to the Home,
she had been assigned to a little bed next the one that Jane occupied,
and had been more or less under the elder girl's care. Jane had been
very good to the child, and with her womanly ways and superior
knowledge she stood to Polly for both mother and sister. No wonder,
then, that she gasped at Jane's threat. What would she do if that threat
were carried out, and Jane had nothing more to do with her? What would
life be in the Home without Jane?

Polly did not ask herself these questions in exactly these words, but
she felt the desolate possibility that had been suggested to her; and it
was so appalling that it quite overpowered her flare of temper, and
stopped her sobs and cries as effectually as Jane could have desired.
But Jane herself, busy with her darning, did not notice the expression
of Polly's face, and had no idea how deeply her words had penetrated the
child's mind until hours afterwards, when, as she was preparing to go to
bed, Polly's voice called softly,--

"Jane, haven't I been a good girl since?"

Jane started. "What in the world are you awake for now, Polly Price?"