y do look so pretty over pink frocks, don't they?"

"Yes, and I must teach you how to wash and get them up."

"Oh!" Mona's interest grew suddenly lukewarm. "I hate washing and
ironing, don't you, mother?"

"I like other kinds of work better, perhaps. I think I should like the
washing if I didn't get so tired with it. I don't seem to have the
strength to do it as I want it done. It is lovely, though, to see things
growing clean under one's hand, isn't it?"

But Mona had never learnt to take pride in her work. "I don't know,"
she answered indifferently. "I should never have things that were
always wanting washing."

Lucy rose to go about her morning's work. "Oh, come now," she said,
smiling, "I can't believe that. Don't you think your little room looks
prettier with the white vallance and quilt and the frill across the window
than it would without?"

"Oh, yes!" Mona agreed enthusiastically. "But then I didn't have to wash
them and iron them."

"Well, I had to, and I enjoyed it, because I was thinking how nice they
would make your room look, and how pleased you would be."

"I don't see that. If you were doing them for yourself, of course, you'd
be pleased, but I can't see why anyone should be pleased about what other
people may like."

"Oh, Mona! can't you?" Lucy looked amazed. "Haven't you ever heard the
saying, 'there is more pleasure in giving than in receiving'?"

"Yes, I think I've heard it," said Mona, flippantly, "but I never saw any
sense in it. There's lots of things said that ain't a bit true."

"This is true enough," said Lucy quietly, "and I hope you'll find it so
for yourself, or you will miss half the pleasure in life."

"Well, I don't believe in any of those old sayings," retorted Mona,
rising too. "Anyway, receiving's good enough for me!" and she laughed
boisterously, thinking she had said something new and funny.

A little cloud rested for a moment on Lucy's face, but only for a moment.
"It isn't nice to hear you speak like that, Mona," she said quietly,
a note of pain in her voice, "but I can't make myself believe yet that you
are as selfish as you make out. I believe," looking across at her
stepdaughter with kindly, smiling eyes, "that you've got as warm a heart
as anybody, really."

And at the words and the look all the flippant, silly don't-careishness
died out of Mona's thoughts and manner.

Yet, presently, when in her own little room again, she opened her little
blue