This had been written a little at a time during Nance's first week at Forest Home. She had arrived in such a burning state of indignation that it required the combined efforts of the superintendent and the matron to calm her. In fact her spirit did not break until she was subjected to a thorough scrubbing from head to foot, and put to bed on a long porch between cold, clean sheets. She was used to sleeping in her underclothes in the hot close air of Snawdor's flat, with Fidy and Lobelia snuggled up on each side. This icy isolation was intolerable! Her hair, still damp, felt strange and uncomfortable; her eyes smarted from the recent application of soap. She lay with her knees drawn up to her chin and shivered and cried to go home. Hideous thoughts tormented her. Who'd git up the coal, an' do the washin'? Would Mr. Snawdor fergit an' take off Rosy's aesophedity bag, so she'd git the measles an' die like the baby? What did Mr. Lavinski think of her fer not comin' to work out the slipper money? Would Dan ever git his place back at the factory after he'd been in the House of Refuse? Was Mr. Smelts' leg broke plum off, so's he'd have to hobble on a peg-stick? She cowered under the covers. "God aint no friend of mine," she sobbed miserably. When she awoke the next morning, she sat up and looked about her. The porch in which she lay was enclosed from floor to ceiling in glass, and there were rows of small white beds like her own, stretching away on each side of her. The tip of her nose was very cold, but the rest of her was surprisingly warm, and the fresh air tasted good in her mouth. It was appallingly still and strange, and she lay down and listened for the sounds that did not come. There were no factory whistles, no clanging of car bells, no lumbering of heavy wagons. Instead of the blank wall of a warehouse upon which she was used to opening her eyes, there were miles and miles of dim white fields. Presently a wonderful thing happened. Something was on fire out there at the edge of the world--something big and round and red. Nance held her breath and for the first time in her eleven years saw the sun rise. When getting-up time came, she went with eighteen other girls into a big, warm dressing-room. "This is your locker," said the girl in charge. "My whut?" asked Nance. "Your locker, where you put your clothes." Nance had no clothes except the ones she was about to put on, but the prospect of being the sole possessor of one of those little closets brought her the first gleam of consolation. The next followed swiftly. The owner of the adjoining locker proved to be no other than Birdie Smelts. Whatever fear Nance had of Birdie's resenting the part she had played in landing Mr. Smelts in the city hospital was promptly banished. "You can't tell me nothing about paw," Birdie said at the end of Nance's recital. "I only wish it was his neck instead of his leg that was broke."