stream down
the pane. "This makes me think of that afternoon in old Lloydsboro
Seminary," she said, musingly, "when Ida Shane read the 'Fortunes of
Daisy Dale' aloud to us. I wonder what has become of Ida. She was living
in a little country town up in the mountains the last time I heard of
her, taking in sewing and doing her own work."

"She's the girl who caused so much excitement at the Seminary," Betty
explained to Gay. "The one who got our Shadow Club into disgrace. She
tried to elope one night, but the teachers found it out and sent her
home. It didn't do any good, for she ran away with Ned Bannon the next
summer, and they were married by a justice of the peace. I don't see how
Ida could do it when she'd always been so romantic, and planned to have
her wedding just like Daisy Dale's, in cherry blossom time, and in the
little stone church at Lloydsboro, with the vines over the belfry. It's
so quaint and English looking, just like the one that Daisy was married
in. Instead of being all in white, she was married in the dress she
happened to have on when she ran away,--just an old black walking skirt
and plaid shirt-waist. No veil, no trail, and no orange-blossoms, and
she had counted on having all three. It was so prosy and commonplace
after the grand things she had planned."

"She's had it prosy enough ever since, too," remarked Allison. "Ned
drinks so hard that he can't keep a position. She didn't reform him one
single bit, and I reckon she understands now why her aunt objected so
strongly to her marrying him. Poor Ida, to think of her having to take
in sewing to keep her from actual starvation! It's awful!"

"Poah Ida!" echoed Lloyd. "I don't see how she does it. When she was in
the Seminary, she couldn't do anything with her needle but embroidah. I
used to have Mom Beck do her mending and darning when she did mine."

"Thank fortune _my_ mending is done!" exclaimed Allison, dropping her
thimble into her work-bag, and throwing her coat across a chair. "It's
almost time for the bell. I must take Juliet Lynn the papers I promised
her."

Lloyd and Betty, looking at the clock, scrambled to their feet, and a
moment after only Gay and Kitty were left on the rug with the
memory-book open between them.

"Do you think that Lloyd really cares for your cousin?" asked Gay.

"No," was the emphatic answer. "You can make her blush that way about
anybody, and I love to tease her. When she first came back from Arizona,
I us