e don't," she pleaded; "I'm so tired of being
scolded. I got off the train because Mrs. Hicks was so cross I couldn't
stand it any longer. She said I was a lazy, good-for-nothing girl, and
she wished she had never promised to take me to Kansas. I said I wished
she hadn't either, and that I didn't want to go to Kansas or anywhere
else with her, and then she said I was an impudent little wretch, and
she wished she could get rid of me. She slapped me, too, and that made
me furious, so when she sent me to the dining-car to get some milk for
the baby, and the train was standing still, I just got off. I don't
want to stay with people who don't like me, and I can't stand being
slapped."

"But think how frightened your friend must have been when the train
started and you didn't come back," said Marjorie, reproachfully. She did
not know quite what to make of this singular young person, who appeared
to think nothing of deserting her friends, and wandering off by herself
on the prairie.

"Mrs. Hicks isn't my friend, and she won't care, anyway; she'll be glad
to get rid of me. I heard her telling a woman on the train that I was an
awful nuisance, and she couldn't think why she had ever promised her
sister to take me to Kansas with her. She doesn't want me--nobody wants
me, nobody in the whole world!" And suddenly this extraordinary visitor
put both hands before her face, and burst into tears.

Marjorie sprang to her feet, wide awake at last. She had not seen many
people cry, and the sight always affected her deeply.

"Oh, don't, please don't!" she cried, and almost without realizing what
she was doing she had slipped an arm about the shaking shoulders. "We'll
take care of you, of course we will, and you can tell us about
everything. Oh, please do stop crying; you make me so very
uncomfortable."

But the brown-eyed girl did not stop crying. On the contrary, she cried
all the harder, and buried her face on Marjorie's shoulder.

"You're kind, oh, you're kind!" sobbed the poor child, clinging
convulsively to her new friend. "Nobody was ever kind to me before
except old Mr. Jackson, and now he's dead. I've been so miserable, and
it's so dreadful not to remember anything, not even my name."

"Your name?" repeated Marjorie stupidly; "do you mean you don't even
know your own name?"

The stranger shook her head mournfully as she searched for a missing
pocket-handkerchief. Marjorie supplied the handkerchief from her own
pocket, and