"I didn't ask either of you," Miss Breck said with the brisk amused
air of correction that made the girls a little afraid of her. "It's
Martie here I'm interested in. I'm going to scold her, too. Are you
reading that book I gave you, Martie?"

Martie, as Grace and Sally turned away, raised smiling eyes. But at
Miss Fanny's keen, kindly look she was smitten with a sudden curious
inclination toward tears. She was keenly sensitive, and she felt an
undeserved rebuke.

"Don't like it?" asked the librarian, disposing of an interruption
with that casual ease that always fascinated Martie. To see Miss
Fanny seize four books from the hands that brought them into her
range of vision, flip open the four covers with terrific speed,
manipulate various paper slips and rubber stamps with energy and
certainty, vigorously copy certain mysterious letters and numbers,
toss the discarded books into a large basket at her elbow and then,
for the first time, as she handed the selected books to the
applicant, glance up with her smile and whispered "Good afternoon,"
was a real study in efficiency.

"I don't understand it," Martie smiled.

"Did you read it?" persisted the older woman.

"Well--not much." Martie had, in fact, hardly opened the book, an
excellent collection of some twenty essays for girls under the
general title "Choosing a Life Work."