earn mine," she said.

"How?" he asked doubtfully.

"I'll pick cotton."

"Can you?"

"Course I can."

"It's hard work."

She hesitated.

"I don't like to work," she mused. "You see, mammy's pappy was a king's
son, and kings don't work. I don't work; mostly I dreams. But I can
work, and I will--for the wonder things--and for you."

So the summer yellowed and silvered into fall. All the vacation days
Bles worked on the farm, and Zora read and dreamed and studied in the
wood, until the land lay white with harvest. Then, without warning, she
appeared in the cotton-field beside Bles, and picked.

It was hot, sore work. The sun blazed; her bent and untrained back
pained, and the soft little hands bled. But no complaint passed her
lips; her hands never wavered, and her eyes met his steadily and
gravely. She bade him good-night, cheerily, and then stole away to the
wood, crouching beneath the great oak, and biting back the groans that
trembled on her lips. Often, she fell supperless to sleep, with two
great tears creeping down her tired cheeks.

When school-time came there was not yet money enough, for cotton-picking
was not far advanced. Yet Zora would take no money from Bles, and worked
earnestly away.

Meantime there occurred to the boy the momentous question of clothes.
Had Zora thought of them? He feared not. She knew little of clothes and
cared less. So one day in town he dropped into Caldwell's "Emporium"
and glanced hesitantly at certain ready-made dresses. One caught his
eye. It came from the great Easterly mills in New England and was red--a
vivid red. The glowing warmth of this cloth of cotton caught the eye of
Bles, and he bought the gown for a dollar and a half.

He carried it to Zora in the wood, and unrolled it before her eyes that
danced with glad tears. Of course, it was long and wide; but he fetched
needle and thread and scissors, too. It was a full month after school
had begun when they, together back in the swamp, shadowed by the
foliage, began to fashion the wonderful garment. At the same time she
laid ten dollars of her first hard-earned money in his hands.

"You can finish the first year with this money," Bles assured her,
delighted, "and then next year you must come in to board; because, you
see, when you're educated you won't want to live in the swamp."

"I wants to live here always."

"But not at Elspeth's."

"No-o--not there, not there." And a troubled questioning trembled in her