to say--"

"Don't!" ejaculated Aunt Olivia, trembling on her Plummer pedestal. For
she was laboring with the impulse to refuse to listen to this intruder,
to drive her away--to say: "I won't believe a word you say! You may as
well go home."

"Hoity-toity!" breathed Duty in her ear. It saved her.

"Well?" she said, gently. "Go on."

"I'm sorry to say I can't teach Rebecca Mary any more, Miss Plummer.
That's what I came to tell you--"

This was awful--awful! But hot rebellion rose in Aunt Olivia's heart.
There was some mistake--it was some other Rebecca Mary this person
meant. She would never believe it was HERS--the Plummer one!

"Because I've taught her all I know. There! Do you wonder I chose the
lowest step to sit on? But it's the truth, honest," the little teacher
laughed girlishly, but there were shame spots on her cheeks--"Rebecca
Mary is the smartest scholar I've got, and I've taught her all I know."
In her voice there was confession to having taught Rebecca Mary a little
more than that. The shame spots flickered in a halo of humble honesty.

"She's been from Percentage through the arithmetic four times--Rebecca
Mary's splendid in arithmetic. And she knows the geography and grammar
by heart."

The look on Aunt Olivia's face! The transition from horror to pride was
overwhelming, transfiguring.

"Rebecca Mary's smart," added the honest one on the doorstep. "_I_ think
she ought to have a chance. There! That's all I came for, so I'll
be going. Only, I don't suppose--you don't think you'll have to tell
Rebecca Mary, do you? About--about me, I mean?"

"No, I don't," Aunt Olivia assured her, warmly. Her thin, lined hand met
and held for a moment the small, plump one--long enough to say, "You're
a good girl--I like you," in its own way. The little teacher went away
in some sort comforted for having taught Rebecca Mary all she knew.
She even hummed a relieved little tune on her way home, because of the
pleasant tingle in the hand that Rebecca Mary's aunt had squeezed. After
all, no matter how much you dreaded doing it, it was better to tell the
truth.

Aunt Olivia hummed no relieved little tune. The pride in her heart
battled with the Dread there and went down. Aunt Olivia did not call the
Dread by any other name. It was Duty who dared.

Confronting Aunt Olivia: "I suppose you know what it means? I suppose
you know it means you've got to give Rebecca Mary a chance? When are you
going to send her away to sch