rats, and was always glad Emily was with her when she heard their
hateful squeak and rush and scratching. One of her "pretends" was that
Emily was a kind of good witch and could protect her. Poor little Sara!
everything was "pretend" with her. She had a strong imagination; there
was almost more imagination than there was Sara, and her whole forlorn,
uncared-for child-life was made up of imaginings. She imagined and
pretended things until she almost believed them, and she would scarcely
have been surprised at any remarkable thing that could have happened. So
she insisted to herself that Emily understood all about her troubles and
was really her friend.

"As to answering," she used to say, "I don't answer very often. I never
answer when I can help it. When people are insulting you, there is
nothing so good for them as not to say a word--just to look at them and
think. Miss Minchin turns pale with rage when I do it. Miss Amelia looks
frightened, so do the girls. They know you are stronger than they are,
because you are strong enough to hold in your rage and they are not,
and they say stupid things they wish they hadn't said afterward. There's
nothing so strong as rage, except what makes you hold it in--that's
stronger. It's a good thing not to answer your enemies. I scarcely ever
do. Perhaps Emily is more like me than I am like myself. Perhaps she
would rather not answer her friends, even. She keeps it all in her
heart."

But though she tried to satisfy herself with these arguments, Sara did
not find it easy. When, after a long, hard day, in which she had been
sent here and there, sometimes on long errands, through wind and cold
and rain; and, when she came in wet and hungry, had been sent out again
because nobody chose to remember that she was only a child, and that
her thin little legs might be tired, and her small body, clad in