shillings a week. The elder girls in the schoolroom
knew that if Miss Minchin did not send Sara away it was for practical
reasons of her own.

"She's growing so fast and learning such a lot, somehow," said Jessie
to Lavinia, "that she will be given classes soon, and Miss Minchin
knows she will have to work for nothing. It was rather nasty of you,
Lavvy, to tell about her having fun in the garret. How did you find it
out?"

"I got it out of Lottie. She's such a baby she didn't know she was
telling me. There was nothing nasty at all in speaking to Miss
Minchin. I felt it my duty"--priggishly. "She was being deceitful.
And it's ridiculous that she should look so grand, and be made so much
of, in her rags and tatters!"

"What were they doing when Miss Minchin caught them?"

"Pretending some silly thing. Ermengarde had taken up her hamper to
share with Sara and Becky. She never invites us to share things. Not
that I care, but it's rather vulgar of her to share with servant girls
in attics. I wonder Miss Minchin didn't turn Sara out--even if she
does want her for a teacher."

"If she was turned out where would she go?" inquired Jessie, a trifle
anxiously.

"How do I know?" snapped Lavinia. "She'll look rather queer when she
comes into the schoolroom this morning, I should think--after what's
happened. She had no dinner yesterday, and she's not to have any
today."

Jessie was not as ill-natured as she was silly. She picked up her book
with a little jerk.

"Well, I think it's horrid," she said. "They've no right to starve her
to death."

When Sara went into the kitchen that morning the cook looked askance at
her, and so did the housemaids; but she passed them hurriedly. She had,
in fact, overslept herself a little, and as Becky had done the same,
neither had had time to see the other, and each had come downstairs in
haste.

Sara went into the scullery. Becky was violently scrubbing a kettle,
and was actually gurgling a little song in her throat. She looked up
with a wildly elated face.

"It was there when I wakened, miss--the blanket," she whispered
excitedly. "It was as real as it was last night."

"So was mine," said Sara. "It is all there now--all of it. While I
was dressing I ate some of the cold things we left."

"Oh, laws! Oh, laws!" Becky uttered the exclamation in a sort of
rapturous groan, and ducked her head over her kettle just in time, as
the cook came in from the kitchen.

Mis