"Whom do you mean by 'father'?" asked Miss Hardy. "I thought you were an orphan." Rhoda gave Miss Hardy a short account of her life. "It was a most heartless and shameful proceeding," said Miss Hardy, who had a capacity for virtuous indignation. "I never heard anything worse." "I believe I should think so if any one else had been the sufferer. And I don't think I did anything to deserve it, Miss Hardy. Of course I sometimes did wrong, like other children, but I do think I was as good as the average, and I am sure not one of the children I knew took more pains to please their parents than I did, or loved them more." "I have no doubt of it. But even if you had not been as good as the average, it would have been no excuse for turning you off." "So it seems to me," remarked Rhoda. "It seems to me that people are as much bound to children they adopt as to their own by birth. I remember, when we were at Aunt Annie's, a lady's saying to her,— "'My husband and myself adopted a child one time, and had her name changed, and all, but as she grew older, she showed so many of her inherited tendencies that we had to let her go.' "'Suppose she had been your own child, and had showed the same tendencies, would you have turned her off?' asked Uncle Evans. "But the lady thought that was different." "Yes, I dare say. But, Rhoda, not to pursue that matter any further, suppose I were to take you into the school on the same footing as the other scholars, giving you the advantage of the professor's lessons in music, could you contrive to clothe yourself, do you think?" The world seemed to turn round with Rhoda for a moment at this question. Then she steadied herself by picking up a dropped stitch, and answered, quietly,— "Yes, ma'am, I think so. I have a good stock of clothes, and I have seventy-five dollars in the bank at Milby and twenty-five here. I should think, with what I have, that ought to dress me for two years. I should have to be very plain, of course, but I think I could be decent." "I have no doubt of it. How old are you?" "I was sixteen last Christmas." "Well, suppose you make the most of your time for three years; do you think at the end of that time you could be ready to take hold and help Mrs. Marshall and myself in the school? Because if you do, I think we will try it." Rhoda tried to speak, but the words would not come. Instead came a great burst of thankful, joyful tears. "Tut, tut!" said Miss Hardy. "That will never do. Don't you know the doctor said I must be kept quiet?" "I am very silly," said Rhoda, striving to compose herself; "but oh, Miss Hardy, if you knew how I have longed for such a chance when I have seen the scholars going to their lessons! I felt as if I would work like a slave only to have their opportunities. I have tried every way to save money, hoping I might get enough to pay my board at least a year while I went to the public schools. But I never thought of a chance like this."