understood that the little black bag about her sister's neck, which
she had innocently taken for a memento of Ramy, was some kind of
sacrilegious amulet, and her fingers shrank from its contact when
she bathed and dressed Evelina. It seemed to her the diabolical
instrument of their estrangement.


XIII


Spring had really come at last. There were leaves on the
ailanthus-tree that Evelina could see from her bed, gentle clouds
floated over it in the blue, and now and then the cry of a flower-
seller sounded from the street.

One day there was a shy knock on the back-room door, and
Johnny Hawkins came in with two yellow jonquils in his fist. He
was getting bigger and squarer, and his round freckled face was
growing into a smaller copy of his father's. He walked up to
Evelina and held out the flowers.

"They blew off the cart and the fellow said I could keep 'em.
But you can have 'em," he announced.

Ann Eliza rose from her seat at the sewing-machine and tried
to take the flowers from him.

"They ain't for you; they're for her," he sturdily objected;
and Evelina held out her hand for the jonquils.