f waxy sweetness
and in the centre of each cake was a fat turtle made from a raisin with
cloves for head and feet. The remainder of the basket was filled with
big spiced pears that could be held by their stems while they were
eaten. The girls shrieked and attacked the cookies, and of all the
treats Elnora offered perhaps none was quite so long remembered as that.

When Elnora took her basket, placed her books in it, and started home,
all the girls went with her as far as the fence where she crossed the
field to the swamp. At parting they kissed her good-bye. Elnora was a
happy girl as she hurried home to thank her mother. She was happy over
her books that night, and happy all the way to school the following
morning.

When the music swelled from the orchestra her heart almost broke with
throbbing joy. For music always had affected her strangely, and since
she had been comfortable enough in her surroundings to notice things,
she had listened to every note to find what it was that literally hurt
her heart, and at last she knew. It was the talking of the violins.
They were human voices, and they spoke a language Elnora understood. It
seemed to her that she must climb up on the stage, take the instruments
from the fingers of the players and make them speak what was in her
heart.

That night she said to her mother, "I am perfectly crazy for a violin. I
am sure I could play one, sure as I live. Did any one----" Elnora never
completed that sentence.

"Hush!" thundered Mrs. Comstock. "Be quiet! Never mention those things
before me again--never as long as you live! I loathe them! They are a
snare of the very devil himself! They were made to lure men and women
from their homes and their honour. If ever I see you with one in your
fingers I will smash it in pieces."

Naturally Elnora hushed, but she thought of nothing else after she had
finished her lessons. At last there came a day when for some reason the
leader of the orchestra left his violin on the grand piano. That morning
Elnora made her first mistake in algebra. At noon, as soon as the
building was empty, she slipped into the auditorium, found the side door
which led to the stage, and going through the musicians' entrance she
took the violin. She carried it back into the little side room where the
orchestra assembled, closed all the doors, opened the case and lifted
out the instrument.

She laid it on her breast, dropped her chin on it and drew the bow
softly across