thought checked her refusal before it reached her lips.

"I suppose some of the young girls go to the Circle?" she said
craftily.

"Oh, they all go," said the minister's wife. "Janet Moore and
Miss Gray are our most enthusiastic members. It is very lovely
of Miss Gray to give her Saturday afternoons--the only ones
she has free from pupils--to our work. But she really has the
sweetest disposition."

"I'll join your Circle," said the Old Lady promptly. She was
determined she would do it, if she had to live on two meals a
day to save the necessary fee.

She went to the Sewing Circle at James Martin's the next
Saturday, and did the most beautiful hand sewing for them. She
was so expert at it that she didn't need to think about it at
all, which was rather fortunate, for all her thoughts were
taken up with Sylvia, who sat in the opposite corner with
Janet Moore, her graceful hands busy with a little boy's
coarse gingham shirt. Nobody thought of introducing Sylvia to
Old Lady Lloyd, and the Old Lady was glad of it. She sewed
finely away, and listened with all her ears to the girlish
chatter which went on in the opposite corner. One thing she
found out--Sylvia's birthday was the twentieth of August. And
the Old Lady was straightway fired with a consuming wish to
give Sylvia a birthday present. She lay awake most of the
night wondering if she could do it, and most sorrowfully
concluded that it was utterly out of the question, no matter