Aunt 'Mira loved finery. Janice had to use her influence to the utmost to keep the good lady from committing the sin of getting this wonderful dress too "fancy." Left to herself, Mrs. Day would have loaded it with bead trimming and cut-steel ornaments. At first she even wanted it cut "minaret" fashion, which would have, in the end, made the poor lady look a good deal like an overgrown ballet dancer! Janice had been glad to go to church. Always, before coming to Poketown, the girl had held a vital interest in church and church work. But here she found there was really nothing for the young people to do. They had no society, and aside from the Sunday School, a very cut-and-dried session usually, there was no special interest for the young. Mr. Middler, the pastor, was a mild-voiced, softly stepping man, evidently fearing to give offense. Although he had been in the pastorate for several years, he seemed to have very little influence in the community. Elder Concannon and several other older members controlled the church and its policies utterly; and they frowned on any innovation. One Sabbath, old Elder Concannon--a grizzled, heavy-eyebrowed man, with a beak-like nose and flashing black eyes--preached, and he thundered out the "Law" to his hearers as a man might use a goad on a refractory team of oxen. Mr. Middler was a faint echo of the old Elder on most occasions. He seemed afraid of taking his text from the New Testament. It was Law, not Love, that was preached at the Poketown Union Church; and although the dissertations may have been satisfactory to the older members, they did not attract the young people to service, or feed them when they _did_ come! Janice often wondered if the loud "Amens!" of Elder Concannon, down in the corner, were worth as much to poor little Mr. Middler as would have been a measure of vital interest shown in the church and its work by some of the young people of the community. There was a Ladies Sewing Circle. There is always a Ladies Sewing Circle! But, somehow, the making up of barrels of cast-off clothing for unfortunate missionaries in the West, or up in Canada, or the sewing together of innumerable ill-cut garments, which must, of course, be "misfits" for the unknown infants for whom they were intended,--all this never could seem sufficient to "feed the spirit," to Janice Day's mind. Once or twice she went with Aunt 'Mira (who was proud of her new clothes and would occasionally go about to show them, now) to the sewing society meeting. But there were few other young girls there, and the gossip was not seasoned to her taste. One day came a letter from Daddy's friend and business associate in Juarez. For three weeks Janice had not received a word from her father. The man in Juarez wrote: "DEAR MISS JANICE:--