"Don't put on a face like that, miss!" she said sharply on seeing Laura's air. "Do you think I'm making it for my own pleasure?" She had sewn at it all day, and was hot and tired.

"It's too short," said Laura, looking down.

"It's nothing of the kind," said Mother, with her mouth full of pins.

"It is, it's much too short."

Mother gave her a slight shake. "Don't you contradict ME! Do you want to tell me I don't know what length you're to wear your dresses?"

"I won't wear it at all if you don't make it longer," said Laura defiantly.

Pin's chubby, featureless little face lengthened with apprehension.

"Do let her have it just a tiny bit longer, mother dear, dear!" she pleaded.

"Now, Pin, what have you got to do with it I'd like to know!" said Mother, on the verge of losing her temper over the back folds, which WOULD not hang.

"I'm going to school to-morrow, and it's a shame," said Laura in the low, passionate tone that never failed to exasperate Mother, so different was it from her own hearty fashion of venting displeasure. Pin began to sniff, in sheer nervous anxiety.

"Very well then, I won't do another stitch to it!" and Mother, now angry in earnest, got up and bounced out of the room.

"Laura, how can you?" said Pin, dissolving. "It's only you who make her so cross."

"I don't care," said Laura rebelliously, though she was not far off tears herself. "It IS a shame. All the other girls will have dresses down to the tops of their boots, and they'll laugh at me, and call me a [P.4] baby;" and touched by the thought of what lay before her, she, too, began to sniffle. She did not fail, however, to roll the dress up and to throw it unto a corner of the room. She also kicked the ewer, which fell over and flooded the floor. Pin cried more loudly, and ran to fetch Sarah.

Laura returned to the garden. The two little boys came up to her; but she waved them back.

"Let me alone, children. I want to think."

She stood in a becoming attitude by the garden-gate, her brothers hovering in the background.—Then Mother called once more.

"Laura, where are you?"

"Here, mother. What is it?"

"Did you knock this jug over or did Pin?"

"I did, mother."

"Did you do it on purpose?"

"Yes."

"Come here to me."

She went, with lagging steps. But Mother's anger had passed: she was at work on the dress again, and by squinting her eyes Laura could see that a piece was being added to the skirt. She was penitent at once; and when Mother in a sorry voice said: "I'm ashamed of you, Laura. And on your last day, too," her throat grew narrow.

"I didn't mean it, mother."

"If only you would ask properly for things, you would get them."

Laura knew this; knew indeed that, did she coax, Mother could refuse her nothing. But coaxing came hard to her; something within her forbade it.