n get it."

"Can't Louis go with me?"

"No; he has to study one of his lessons, which he missed this morning.
It is high time you were learning to be more self-reliant. I will tell
you just how and where to go."

Edna's heart fluttered at this undertaking. She had never been
downtown alone, and she was much afraid that she could not find the
way, but she decided to do the best she could, especially as she knew
her aunt would consider any objection in the light of disobedience.

It was all very easy to get in the car, pay her fare, and ask the
conductor to let her out at such a street; so she managed very easily
to reach the shop and get the ribbon; but to take the car home she was
obliged to cross the street, and here came trouble, for there were
horses dashing up and down, trolley cars coming this way and that,
and, altogether, it was a very confusing point. Therefore Edna stood a
long time on the curb before she dared to venture across, but finally
she summoned up courage when the way seemed tolerably clear, and she
managed to reach the opposite side; but looking back at a trolley car
which seemed close at hand she hurried faster than her stout little
legs could be relied upon to take her, and down she went in the mud of
the gutter. She picked herself up in an agony of shame, lest she
should be laughed at, and ran on as fast as she could up the street,
but, unfortunately, in the wrong direction; for when she stood still
and looked about her there were no blue cars to be seen, and it all
looked strange.

She felt in her pocket for her parcel; it was safe, but her car fare
was gone, and she stood a pitiful, mud-besmeared little object. Then
the big tears began to come as she walked along very fast. "O dear,
I'm lost!" she said to herself, "and I'll have to walk home, and Aunt
Elizabeth is in a hurry, and she'll scold me! O dear! O dear! I want
my own home, I do, I do." She began then to run along very fast again,
to hide her tears from passers-by, and presently she came bump up
against another little girl who had also been running.

The two children coming to such an abrupt standstill stared at each
other. Edna saw a poor, ragged, dirty, pale-faced child with wild
locks; and the little girl saw Edna with the tears still coursing down
her cheeks, her pretty coat and frock stained with mud, and her hat
knocked very much to one side.

It was the ragged girl who smiled first.

"I 'most knocked ye down, didn't I?"