How It Happened

knocked again. After the third knock she ope

t! I knocked and knocked, but you didn't say co

turned in her chair, and held out her hand. "Hello, Carmencita! I'm glad it's you and not Miss Perkins.

ta, taking up a half-made gingham dress from another, sat in it an

sing on some skirts and waists for them. Every day I'm finding out something else I don't know how to do. I seem to

ng the efforts being made to thread the machine's needle. "I guess when you were a little girl you didn't know ther

h forehead from which the dark hair, parted and brushed back, waved into a loose knot at t

ind out some of the things I did not know about. I wasn't of any particular use to anybody else. No

own here, but you weren't meant not to get married.

nst the wall. "The trouble about getting married is marrying the right man.

make a mistake. Isn't the

e. They belong to-to a long, long time ago. I'm interested now in little girls like you, and in boys, and babies, a

right here"-Carmencita's hand was laid on her breast-"that you aren't going to stay here long, and it makes an awful sink sometimes. You'll go away and forget us, and get married, and go to bal

nodded gaily to the child now standing by her side. "I've tried the parties and balls and-all the other things, and for a while they were very nice; and then one day I found I was spen

eetheart that it matt

irmly, and, turning from them, Frances mad

h they matter-to us. But it was Christmas we were to talk about. It's much nicer to talk about Chri

die. Some babies never will. Did you know Mr. Rheinhimer had been on another spree?" Carmencita, feet fastened in the rounds of her chair, elbows on knees, and chin in the palms of her hand, nodded affirmatively at the face in front of her. "Worst one yet. He smashed all the window-panes in the bedroom, and broke two legs of their best chairs doing it, and threw the

of pennies were gone over again and again, and when at last she got up to go the perple

of the coat. "I'm not going to get anything but Father's present to-night. I won't have to go to school to

east, her eyes grew big and shining. Standing first on one foot and the

ld's mother! And I'm so squirmy and thrilly and shivery, thinking of the things I'd do if I could, that sometimes I'm b

eager ones of the child. "It's a very nice way to feel. When one is young-

much rather love people, though. I love to love! It makes you feel so nice and warm and homey. If I had a house I'd have everybody I know-I mean all the nice everybodies-to spend Christm

neck. "It's the time to wipe out and forget things, Father says. It's the home-time and the heart-tim

ng to do on Christmas day. My people live in different places and far ap

atching, saw the face turned from hers twist in sudden pain. For a moment she stood puzzled and helple

f her friend. "There are too many wanting you. Father and I can't give fine presents or have a fine dinner, but there wouldn'

" She took out her watch hurriedly and looked at it. "It's after half past five, Carmencita. You will have to hurry or you won't see the wedding guests go in. Good-by, dear. Have a good time and tuck away all you see to tell me later. I will be so busy b

friend's. "It would have lasted for ever if it hadn't got burned up. It fell in the fire and got burned up." Out in the hall s

ers to be attended to on the next day. When at last through, with the reaction that comes from overtired body and nerves she leaned back in her chair and let her hands fall idly in her lap, and with eyes that saw

All through the year I know, but never as I do at Christmas. And we-we are each other's, Stephen!" With a proud uplifting of her head she