"Gladys, you are such a ninny," said Maria. "Why don't you remember
what you learn at school, instead of what you hear at home?"

"I guess I hear more at home than I learn at school," Gladys replied,
with an adoring glance at Maria.

Maria half despised Gladys, and yet she had a sort of protective
affection for her, as one might have for a little clinging animal,
and she confided more in her than in any one else, sure, at least, of
an outburst of sympathy. Maria had never forgotten how Gladys had
cried the first morning she went to school after her mother died.
Every time Gladys glanced at poor little Maria, in her black dress,
her head went down on a ring of her little, soiled, cotton-clad arms
on her desk, and Maria knew that she was sorrier for her than any
other girl in school.

Gladys had a sort of innocent and ignorant impertinence; she asked
anything which occurred to her, with no reflection as to its effect
upon the other party.

"Say, is it true?" she asked that very morning at recess.

"Is what true?"

"Is your father goin' to marry her?"

"Marry who?" Maria turned quite pale, and forgot her own grammar.

"Why, your aunt Maria."