the piano with a queer look on her
face.

"I believe she means mischief," thought Grace to herself, as she watched
the girl curiously.

Miriam ran a brilliant scale up the piano, for music was another of her
many accomplishments. Then she paused and turned to the others.

"I won't sing," she said, "unless Miss Pierson promises to recite us
something first, Poe's 'Raven,' for instance."

Grace flushed angrily and was about to interfere when, to her surprise,
Anne herself replied:

"I shall be glad to if that is the poem you like best. I always
preferred 'Annabel Lee.'"

Miriam was too amazed to answer. She could never form an idea of what it
cost Anne in self-control to acquiesce; but the young girl had gained a
new strength that day. So many people had been kind to her, and what is
more, interested in her welfare. She rose quietly and walked to the
middle of the semicircle.

Grace and her chums were in an agony of fear lest poor Anne should break
down, and so distress them all except the unkind Miriam. However, they
need not have troubled themselves. Anne fixed her eyes on the far wall
of the dining room and commenced to recite "The Raven" in a clear,
musical voice that deepened as she repeated the stanzas. The girls
forgot the shabby little figure in its ill-fitting black silk and saw
only Anne's small, white face and glowing eyes. Not Miss Tebbs, herself,
teacher of English and elocution at the High School, could have improved
upon the performance.

"It was perfectly done," said Grace afterwards, telling the story to her
mother. "It was almost uncanny and quite creepy toward the last."

When the performance was over the girls crowded around little Anne with
eager congratulations; but, strange to say, everyone forgot that Miriam
had given her promise to sing.

What the crestfallen Miriam kept wondering was: "Wherever did she learn
to do it?"

CHAPTER III

MRS. GRAY ENGAGES A SECRETARY

Grace and her two friends, Jessica and Nora, were also invited to Mrs.
Gray's luncheon the next day, after church. Grace had often taken meals
in the beautiful house on Chapel Hill, but the other girls had never
been privileged to do more than sit in the large, shady parlors while
their mothers paid an afternoon call.

It was with some excitement, therefore, that the three girls met in
front of the Catholic Church, of which Nora was a member, and strolled
up the broad street together. As they passed the little