at the head of your division and let you have entire charge of this
little boy. He is only a year old, Kate tells me, so will need
constant attention."

Lovey Mary was about to protest, when Kate broke in:

"Oh, say, Miss Bell, please get some other girl! Tommy never would
like Lovey. He's just like me: if people ain't pretty, he don't have
no use for 'em."

"That will do, Kate," said Miss Bell, coldly. "It is only pity for the
child that makes me take him at all. You have forfeited all claim upon
our sympathy or patience. Mary, take the baby up-stairs and care for
him until I come."

Lovey Mary, hot with rebellion, picked him up and went out of the
room. At the door she stumbled against two little girls who were
listening at the keyhole.

Up-stairs in the long dormitory it was very quiet. The children had
been marched away to Sunday-school, and only Lovey Mary and the
sleeping baby were on the second floor. The girl sat beside the little
white bed and hated the world as far as she knew it: she hated Kate
for adding this last insult to the old score; she hated Miss Bell for
putting this new burden on her unwilling shoulders; she hated the
burden itself, lying there before her so serene and unconcerned; and
most of all she hated herself.

"I wisht I was dead!" she cried passionately. "The harder I try to be
good the meaner I get. Ever'body blames me, and ever'body makes fun of