atter?"

Mary-'Gusta seated herself upon an empty cranberry crate. The partners
had a joint interest in a small cranberry bog and the crate was one of
several unused the previous fall.

"There's nothin' the matter," she said, solemnly. "I've been thinkin',
that's all."

"Want to know!" observed the Captain. "Well, what made you do anything
as risky as that?"

Mary-'Gusta's forehead puckered.

"I was playin' with Jimmie Bacheldor yesterday," she said, "and he made
me think."

Abner Bacheldor was the nearest neighbor. His ramshackle dwelling was an
eighth of a mile from the Gould-Hamilton place. Abner had the reputation
of being the meanest man in town; also he had a large family, of which
Jimmie, eight years old, was the youngest.

"Humph!" sniffed Captain Shad. "So Jimmie Bacheldor made you think, eh?
I never should have expected it from one of that tribe. How'd he do it?"

"He asked me about my relations," said Mary-'Gusta, "and when I said I
hadn't got any he was awful surprised. He has ever so many, sisters and
brothers and aunts and cousins and--Oh, everything. He thought 'twas
dreadful funny my not havin' any. I think I'd ought to have some, don't
you?"

The partners, looking rather foolish, said nothing for a moment. Then
Zoeth muttered that he didn't know but she had.

"Yes," said Mary-'Gusta, "I--I think so. You see I'm--I mean I was a
stepchild 'long as father was here. Now he's dead and I ain't even
that. And I ain't anybody's cousin nor nephew nor niece. I just
ain't anything. I'm different from everybody I know. And--and--" very
solemnly--"I don't like to be so different."

Her lip quivered as she said it. Sitting there on the cranberry crate,
hugging her dolls, she was a pathetic little figure. Again the partners
found it hard to answer. Mr. Hamilton looked at the Captain and the
latter, his fingers fidgeting with his watchchain, avoided the look. The
girl went on.

"I was thinking," she said, "how nice 'twould have been if I'd had a--a
brother or somebody of my very own. I've got children, of course, but
they're only dolls and a cat. They're nice, but they ain't real folks.
I wish I had some real folks. Do you suppose if--if I have to go to
the--the orphans' home, there'd be anybody there that would be my
relation? I didn't know but there might be another orphan there who
didn't have anybody, same as me, and then we could make believe we
was--was cousins or somethin'. That would be better t