For four evenings in succession, ever since John Barnes had come to live in the house, Shenah Pessah arrayed herself in her new things and waited. Was it not a miracle that he came the first time when she did not even dream that he was on earth? So why shouldn’t the miracle happen again? This evening, however, she was so spent with the hopelessness of her longing that she had no energy left to put on her adornments. All at once she was startled out of her apathy by a quick tap on her window-pane. “How about going to the library, to-morrow evening?” asked John Barnes. “Oi-i-i! Yes! Thanks--” she stammered in confusion. “Well, to-morrow night, then, at seven. Thank you.” He hurried out embarrassed by the grateful look that shone to him out of her eyes. The gaze haunted him and hurt him. It was the beseeching look of a homeless dog, begging to be noticed. “Poor little immigrant,” he thought, “how lonely she must be!” “So he didn’t forget,” rejoiced Shenah Pessah. “How only the sound from his voice opens the sky in my heart! How the deadness and emptiness in me flames up into life! Ach! The sun is again beginning to shine!” An hour before the appointed time, Shenah Pessah dressed herself in all her finery for John Barnes. She swung open the door and stood in readiness watching the little clock on the mantel-shelf. The ticking thing seemed to throb with the unutterable hopes compressed in her heart, all the mute years of her stifled life. Each little thud of time sang a wild song of released joy--the joy of his coming nearer. For the tenth time Shenah Pessah went over in her mind what she would say to him when he’d come. “It was so kind from you to take from your dear time--to--” “No--that sounds not good. I’ll begin like this--Mr. Barnes! I can’t give it out in words your kindness, to stop from your high thoughts to--to--” “No--no! Oi weh! God from the world! Why should it be so hard for me to say to him what I mean? Why shouldn’t I be able to say to him plain out--Mr. Barnes! You are an angel from the sky! You are saving me my life to let me only give a look on you! I’m happier than a bird in the air when I think only that such goodness like you--” The sudden ring of the bell shattered all her carefully rehearsed phrases and she met his greeting in a flutter of confusion. “My! Haven’t you blossomed out since last night!” exclaimed Mr. Barnes, startled by Shenah Pessah’s sudden display of color. “Yes,” she flushed, raising to him her radiant face. “I’m through for always with old women’s shawls. This is my first American dress-up.” “Splendid! So you want to be an American! The next step will be to take up some work that will bring you in touch with American people.” “Yes. You’ll help me? Yes?” Her eyes sought his with an appeal of unquestioning reliance. “Have you ever thought what kind of work you would like to take up?” he asked, when they got out into the street.