Produced by Heather Clark, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) HOPE BENHAM. A Story for Girls. By NORA PERRY AUTHOR OF "LYRICS AND LEGENDS," "ANOTHER FLOCK OF GIRLS," "A ROSEBUD GARDEN OF GIRLS," ETC. Illustrated by FRANK T. MERRILL. BOSTON: LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. _Copyright, 1894_, BY NORA PERRY. Printers S. J. PARKHILL & CO., BOSTON, U. S. A. [Illustration: "TEN CENTS A BUNCH"] LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. "TEN CENTS A BUNCH" "HE LIFTED THE BOW AND DREW IT ACROSS THE STRINGS" "SHE TOOK HOPE'S VIOLIN FROM HER HANDS" "IT WAS THE WORK OF A MOMENT TO POSSESS HERSELF OF THE BOOK" "HOW DE DO, HOPE?" "SHE STOOD THERE AN IMAGE OF GRACE, HER CHIN BENT LOVINGLY DOWN TO HER VIOLIN" "DON'T, DON'T GO" "HOPE KNELT DOWN BY THE COUCH WHERE DOROTHEA HAD FLUNG HERSELF" HOPE BENHAM. CHAPTER I. "Ten cents a bunch! ten cents a bunch!" A party of three young girls coming briskly around the southwest corner of the smart little Brookside station, hearing this call, turned, then stopped, then exclaimed all together,-- "Oh, how perfectly lovely! the first I have seen. Just what I want!" and they pulled out their purses to buy "just what they wanted," just what everybody wants,--a bunch of trailing arbutus. "And they are made up so prettily, without all that stiff arbor-vitæ framing. What is this dear little leafy border?" asked one of the young ladies, glancing up from her contemplation of the flowers to the flower-seller. "It's the partridge-berry leaf." "Oh! and you picked them all yourself,--the arbutus and this partridge-berry leaf?" "Yes." "Oh!" repeated the young lady, giving a stare at the little flower-seller,--a stare that was quickly followed by another question,-- "Do you live near here?" "Yes; very near." "But you don't find this arbutus in Brookside?" "No, in Riverview." "In Riverview! why, I didn't know that the arbutus grew so near Boston as that." "We have always found a little in Riverview woods, but this year there is quite a large quantity."