highly successful. It was not till a penitent and altogether adorable
Dorothy had been tucked into bed, and kissed uncounted times, that doubt
assailed her. She was moving toward the stairs, when a small voice
arrested her steps.

"Aunt Peggy," Dorothy said dreamily, "you don't spank as hard as my
mamma does. You whipped me just the way Hobo whips himself with his
tail."

CHAPTER XII

THE NEW LUCY

In the week that followed, the education of Lucy Haines progressed
rapidly. After that first afternoon when the time had slipped away
without her knowing it, she kept her eye on the clock and was careful
not to over-stay the hour. But as she came every day, and her enthusiasm
for learning fully matched Peggy's enthusiasm for teaching, the results
were all that could be wished.

Then one afternoon her pupil failed to appear, and Peggy wondered. A
second afternoon brought neither Lucy nor an explanation of her absence.
"I'm afraid she's sick," said Peggy, who never thought of a
discreditable explanation for anything till there was no help for it.

"Sick of algebra, more likely," suggested Claire. "I thought such zeal
wouldn't last."

"She doesn't seem like that sort of a girl," declared Amy, who was
developing a tendency to disagree with Claire on every possible pretext.
"She's one of the stickers, or I don't know one when I see it."

A little assenting murmur went the rounds, and Claire glanced
reproachfully at Priscilla, who had sided against her. "Two souls with
but a single thought," represented Claire's ideal of friendship. That
two people could love each other devotedly, and yet disagree on a
variety of subjects, was beyond her comprehension. She was ready at a
moment's notice to cast aside her personal convictions, and agree with
Priscilla, whatever stand the latter cared to take, and it seemed hard,
in view of such unquestioning loyalty, that Priscilla should persist in
having opinions of her own.

But Claire's hour of triumph was on its way. When Jerry Morton came in
the morning with a string of freshly caught fish, he produced from the
depths of an over-worked pocket a folded paper, which, to judge from its
worn and soiled appearance, had served as a hair-curler or in some
equally trying capacity. This he handed to Peggy, who regarded it with
natural misgiving.

"That Haines girl sent it," Jerry explained. "I put it in the pocket
where I carry the bait, but I guess the inside is all right."

Thu