seen by childish eyes, blue pumps accord with green grass and trees--in
nature, seen by maturer eyes, there is something wrong with the colors.
They look out of place--either the green growing things or the gay blue
pump do not belong there. The girl's loyalty to little, kind Emmeline
Camp would not let her admit that it was the blue pump that didn't
"belong." She was glad--glad--that it was blue, for it stood for a
thoughtful kindness to her, and thoughtful kindnesses had been rare in
her self-dependent, hustling life.

"Hurrah for the blue pump!" she cried softly. She felt like going up to
it and hugging it, but fortunately she did not yield to the impulse.

The other girls arrived at dusk. T.O., her knee in a chair, had hitched
laboriously from little kitchen to little dining-room and got supper.
Spent and triumphant, she waited in the doorway. She could hear their
voices coming up the road--Billy's excited voice, Laura Ann's gay one,
Loraine's calm and sweet. She longed to run out to meet them. Next best,
she sent her own voice, in a clear, long call.

"That's T.O.! Girls, let's run!" she heard Billy say.

"Why doesn't _she_ run?" Laura Ann demanded severely. "That would
be perfectly appropriate under the circumstances."

"'Tis queer, isn't it, that she didn't come to meet us?" Loraine added.
In another moment they had reached Emmeline Camp's little green-painted
house and found the Talented One waiting impatiently at the gate. Things
explained themselves rapidly. Exclamations of pity crowded upon
exclamations of delight and welcome. Four happy young wage-earners sat
down to T.O.'s hardly-prepared little supper and four tongues were