"I was telling Hannah Straight Tree I should buy a big doll for Susie,
and a red silk handkerchief for my father, and a blue silk handkerchief
for my mother, and should hang them on the Christmas tree," said
Cordelia, partly to herself and partly to the little girls.

"Kee! I would not hang them," said a prudent little maid of ten years.
"Hannah Straight Tree told the other girls, and they are very yelous--
that is not the word, but I forget it--for they say they cannot hang
their people anything. They say you think the name 'Running Bird' is
very stylish, and you wish to hear it called so often at the Christmas
tree."

"Of course I shall not hang them," said Cordelia, firmly. "And I shall
not buy a doll for Susie, for my father always buys her one. I was
going to brag about her having two," she added candidly. "And I shall
not buy the silk handkerchiefs. They have the issue cotton ones and
some other ones that my father bought;" and she withdrew her eyes from
the display of cheap and gaudy handkerchiefs of so-called silk material
suspended from the wire. "I shall buy a cake pan with a steeple for my
mother, and a hairbrush for my father, for his hairs stick up so
straight and stiff. And I shall give the presents very still at camp,
so the school will not be jealous."

Having thus subdued her vanity, Cordelia Running Bird shyly bought the
articles she had selected from the trader's boy, who helped his father
in the store. She also bought four hair ribbons and a little bag of
candy, having left two silver quarters. She was considering how to
spend them when her eyes alighted on some little brown shoes and a pair
of stockings matching them, beneath a small glass show-case.

"Ver-r-y st-y-lish little shoes and stockings!" she exclaimed,
forgetting in her rapture to be shy before the trader's boy.

The small girls crowded upon tiptoe at the show-case, peering through
the glass sides to inspect the little wonders.

"Just the color of an Indian," observed a little maid of seven, holding
up her slim hand to compare it with the red-brown shoes and stockings.
"But they made them for a little white girl. They are like the ones the
little white visitor with the pink dress wore last summer."

"They are just as pretty for a little Indian girl," replied Cordelia.
"They would be just right for Susie," with a longing eye.

"But Susie does not need them," said the prudent little girl. "She has
a black shoes and stock