ou should
go to sleep unhappy. The sahib commands you to come to him tomorrow.
You are to be the attendant of missee sahib. Tonight I take these
things back over the roof."

And having said this with a beaming face, he made a little salaam and
slipped through the skylight with an agile silentness of movement which
showed Becky how easily he had done it before.

19

Anne

Never had such joy reigned in the nursery of the Large Family. Never
had they dreamed of such delights as resulted from an intimate
acquaintance with the little-girl-who-was-not-a-beggar. The mere fact
of her sufferings and adventures made her a priceless possession.
Everybody wanted to be told over and over again the things which had
happened to her. When one was sitting by a warm fire in a big, glowing
room, it was quite delightful to hear how cold it could be in an attic.
It must be admitted that the attic was rather delighted in, and that
its coldness and bareness quite sank into insignificance when
Melchisedec was remembered, and one heard about the sparrows and things
one could see if one climbed on the table and stuck one's head and
shoulders out of the skylight.

Of course the thing loved best was the story of the banquet and the
dream which was true. Sara told it for the first time the day after
she had been found. Several members of the Large Family came to take
tea with her, and as they sat or curled up on the hearth-rug she told
the story in her own way, and the Indian gentleman listened and watched
her. When she had finished she looked up at him and put her hand on his
knee.

"That is my part," she said. "Now won't you tell your part of it,
Uncle Tom?" He had asked her to call him always "Uncle Tom." "I don't
know your part yet, and it must be beautiful."

So he told them how, when he sat alone, ill and dull and irritable, Ram
Dass had tried to distract him by describing the passers by, and there
was one child who passed oftener than any one else; he had begun to be
interested in her--partly perhaps because he was thinking a great deal
of a little girl, and partly because Ram Dass had been able to relate
the incident of his visit to the attic in chase of the monkey. He had
described its cheerless look, and the bearing of the child, who seemed
as if she was not of the class of those who were treated as drudges and
servants. Bit by bit, Ram Dass had made discoveries concerning the
wretchedness of her life. He had fou