e
was from the directory, with its solid lines of names; from the speller,
printed in columns of words, or the arithmetic, which was all
hit-or-miss. Here was a page divided into paragraphs, as in the
newspapers which Cis sometimes smuggled in. Before and after many of the
paragraphs were those strange little marks, larger at one end than at
the other, which showed that some one was speaking.

"It's a story!" he whispered back.

Indeed, as he read that first page, it so informed him. Across its top,
in capital letters, ran those words: _THE STORY OF ALADDIN; OR, THE
WONDERFUL LAMP_. All his life he had had to make up his own stories, get
acquainted with the people in them, dress them, and even give them
speech. But here was a story belonging to some one else--a story as
important as that one about his friends David and Goliath, this proven
by the fact that it had been written down, letter for letter.

He began it: _In the capital of one of the large and rich provinces of
the Kingdom of China, the name of which I do not recollect, there lived
a tailor, named Mustapha, who was so poor, that he could hardly, by his
daily labor, maintain himself and his family, which consisted of a wife
and son._

_His son, who was called Aladdin_----

Something came into Johnnie's throat when he got that far. He gulped.
And he could not read any further just then because something had come
into his eyes. He laid the book against his breast, and crossed both
arms upon it. He did not know how to pray. Mrs. Kukor had never dared
teach him, fearing the wrath of Big Tom. As for Cis, she knew how from
her mother; but she had all of a child's natural shyness regarding
sacred subjects.

To Johnnie, Sunday was not a day set apart for sacred matters. It was a
day to be dreaded. And not only because on that day Barber was likely to
be about at any hour, but because for Johnnie it meant uninterrupted
work. The noon meal had to be put on the table instead of into lunch
pails. And when dinner was cleared away there was always bead-stringing
or violet-making to do--Cis helping when she returned from church. On
account of his clothes, Johnnie never went to church himself. What he
knew about churches, therefore, was only what Cis told him; and of her
information the most striking bit was this: red carpets led into them
under gay awnings whenever people were getting married.

But as he stood with the book clasped to his breast, what he felt was
tha