k, and their cries as they committed moral hara-kiri echoed
as far as the marble halls of the Board of Education on remote Park
Avenue.

Mrs. Gonorowsky paid the exorbitant price of a cent to have her official
postcard read by an interpreter. Neighbors volunteered for this service,
but she would have none of them. She wanted an authoritative reading,
and having got it, she sat down to await the return of Eva.

"So-o-oh," ran the maternal greeting, "you comes three times late on the
school mit dirty faces." Eva hung her guilty head. "And I wash you every
day the face, und send you on the block plenty time? Hein?" Eva nodded
the guilty head. "Und now comes such a card from off the school sayin'
how you comes late und dirty, und the Principal, he wants he shall see
me to-morrow, quarter after three." A silence followed these thunderous
words. Eva's guilt engulfed her, although hers was the clearest
conscience among all the candidates for return tickets. Her gentle
spirit had been unequal to the orgy in which braver souls were
wallowing.

"I wants," she whispered now, "I wants I shall be put back. I don't
likes it by Miss Blakeses room. I ain't monitors off of nothings, und
Miss Blake she hollers on me, und Patrick he is put back. I likes I
shall be put back too."

"Sooner you feels like that," said Mrs. Gonorowsky with sound logic,
"why aind you stayed back by Miss Bailey's room? Aind you told me how
you wants you shall be 'moted, and learn off a new book?"

"Not 'out Miss Bailey," Eva protested. "I couldn't to learn 'out Miss
Bailey. I want Miss Bailey shall be 'moted too."

"Und why ain't she 'moted?" demanded the voice of reason.

At this question--its answer had long been torture to her loyal little
heart--Eva broke into wild tears. Changing over to the voice of love,
Mrs. Gonorowsky soothed and cuddled and petted her until Eva found
speech again.

"It's somethin' fierce," she whispered. "In all my world I ain't never
seen how it is fierce. I shall better, maybe, whisper mit you in the
ear. It's like this: She ain't smart enough. Becky Zalmanowsky, she
ain't smart enough, und Hymie Solomon, he ain't smart enough, und Jakey
Fishandler, he is a greeney, und Teacher, she gets left back mit them."

"Gott!" cried Mrs. Gonorowsky, "who says she ain't smart enough?"

"The Principal, maybe," wailed Eva.

"All right," said her mother, whose admiration for Miss Bailey was great
and of long standing. "I goes on the s