"I guess I'll sit down here and put the sticks in them," she said: but instead of touching the cucumbers the child sat on the ground beside the toad forever so long, looking cross, oh, so cross. The toad kept perfectly still and by and by he and the little girl heard a man whistling. In a few minutes there was a long whistle and then no sound in the jungle save the buzzing of flies and the chirping of birds. The little girl was afraid of her uncle who had been her one friend in that land of strangers. Soon she heard them calling and with her apron full of cucumbers, Marian rose to meet him. It may be that the old toad, as he hopped back to the yarrow jungle, thought that he should never again see the little girl: but the next morning in the midst of brightest sunshine, Marian returned, her head drooping. With her little feet she destroyed the farm and then, throwing herself face downward among the ruins, wept bitterly. When she raised her head the old toad was staring solemnly at her, causing fresh tears to overflow upon the round cheeks. "Don't look at me, toad, nobody does," she wailed. "I'm dreadfully bad and it doesn't do a bit of good to be sorry. Nobody loves me and nobody ever will. Aunt Amelia says that Nanna wouldn't love me now. Uncle George doesn't love me, he says he's disappointed in me! Oh, dear, oh, dear! Nobody in this world loves me, toad, and oh, dear, I've got to eat all alone in the kitchen for two weeks, and even the housemaid doesn't love me and can't talk to me! Oh, dear, what made me do it!" What could an old toad do but hide in the yarrow jungle: yet when he turned away Marian felt utterly deserted. It was dreadful to be so bad that even a toad wouldn't look at her. CHAPTER VII AN UNDESERVING CHILD TRY as hard as she would, Marian could not fit into Aunt Amelia's home. Everywhere within its walls, she was Marian the unwanted. Saddest of all, the child annoyed Uncle George. Not at first, to be sure; he liked his little niece in the beginning, but when Aunt Amelia and the little Ella were rendered unhappy by her presence, that made a difference. Early in the summer Uncle George insisted upon taking Marian wherever Ella and her mother went, to picnics, to the circus and other places of amusement, but as something disagreeable was sure to happen and trouble seemed to follow little Marian, she was finally left at home where her gay talk and merriment could not reach the ears of Aunt Amelia, who called her talk "clatter" and her laughter "cackle." "It's cucumbers," sobbed Marian, the first time she was left with the sympathetic housemaid. "What do you mean, you poor little thing?" asked the girl. The child looked up in astonishment. "Don't you remember about the cucumbers?" she asked reproachfully. "Cucumbers," sniffed the girl. "Never mind, you poor, sweet darling, we'll have a tea-party this afternoon, you and I,--that old pelican!"