a dreadful fear of returning to the "institution" from which
Mrs. Atterson had taken her. And Sister's other fearful
remembrance was of an old woman who beat her and drank much gin
and water.

Not that she had been ill-treated at the institution; but she had
been dressed in an ugly uniform, and the girls had been rough and
pulled her "pigtails" like Dan, Junior.

"Once a gentleman came to see me," Sister confided to Hiram. "He
was a lawyer gentleman, the matron told me. He knew my name--but
I've forgotten it now.

"And he said that somebody who once belonged to me--or I once
belonged to them--had died and perhaps there would be some money
coming to me. But it couldn't have been the old woman I lived
with, for she never had only money enough for gin!

"Anyhow, I was glad. I axed him how much money--was it enough
to treat all the girls in the institution one round of ice-cream
soda, and he laffed, he did. And he said yes--just about enough
for that, if he could get it for me. And I ran away and told the
girls.

"I promised them all a treat. But the man never came again, and
by and by the big girls said they believed I storied about it,
and one night they came and dragged me out of bed and hung me
out of the window by my wrists, till I thought my arms would be
pulled right out of the sockets,