He placed another, and with extreme unwillingness and some displeasure Ellen sat down. It was on her tongue to ask if another time would not do, but somehow she could not get the words out. John showed her how to hold her pencil, how to place her paper, where to begin, and how to go on; and then went to the other end of the room and took up his walk again. Ellen at first felt more inclined to drive her pencil _through_ the paper than to make quiet marks upon it. However necessity was upon her. She began her work, and once fairly begun, it grew delightfully interesting. Her vexation went off entirely; she forgot Margaret and her story; the wrinkles on the old trunk smoothed those on her brow, and those troublesome leaves at the branch end brushed away all thoughts of everything else. Her cheeks were burning with intense interest, when the library door burst open and the whole troop of children rushed in; they wanted Ellen for a round game in which all their number were needed; and she must come directly. "I can't come just yet," said she; "I must finish this first." "Afterwards will just do as well," said George; "come, Ellen, do! you can finish it afterwards." "No, I can't," said Ellen; "I can't leave it till it's done. Why, I thought Mr. John was here! I didn't see him go out. I'll come in a little while." "Did _he_ set you about that precious piece of business?" said William. "Yes." "I declare," said Margaret, "he's fitter to be the Grand Turk than any one else I know of." "I'll tell you," said William, putting his mouth close to her ear, and speaking in a disagreeable loud whisper, "it's the biggest gobbler in the yard." "Ain't you ashamed, William?" cried little Ellen Chauncey. "That's it exactly," said Margaret; "always strutting about." "He isn't a bit," said Ellen, very angry; "I've seen people a great deal more like gobblers than he is." "Well," said William, reddening in his turn, "I had rather, at any rate, be a good turkey gobbler than one of those outlandish birds that have an appetite for stones and glass and bits of morocco, and such things. Come, let us leave her to do the Grand Turk's bidding. Come, Ellen Chauncey, you mustn't stay to interrupt her; we want you!" They left her alone. Ellen had coloured, but William's words did not hit very sore. Since John's talk with her about the matter referred to she had thought of it humbly and wisely; it is only pride that makes such fault-finding very hard to bear. She was very sorry, however, that they had fallen out again, and that her own passion, as she feared, had been the cause. A few tears had to be wiped away before she could see exactly how the old tree stood; then, taking up her pencil, she soon forgot everything in her work. It was finished, and with head now on one side, now on the other, she was looking at her picture with very great satisfaction, when her eye caught the figure of John standing before her. "Is it done?" said he.