19. Anne
Never had such jned in the nursery of the Large Family. Never had they dreamed of such delights as resulted from an intimate acquaintah the little-girl-who-was-not-a-beggar. The mere fact of her sufferings and adventures made her a priceless possession. Everybody wao be told over and aihings which had happeo her. When one was sitting by a warm fire in a big, glowing room, it was quite delightful to hear how cold it could be in an attic. It must be admitted that the attic was rather delighted in, and that its ess and bareness quite sank into insignifice when Melchisedec was remembered, and one heard about the sparrows and things one could see if one climbed oable and stues head and shoulders out of the skylight.
Of course the thing loved best was the story of the ba and the dream which was true. Sara told it for the first time the day after she had been found. Several members of the Large Family came to take tea with her, and as they sat or curled up on the hearth-rug she told the story in her own way, and the Indialeman listened and watched her. When she had finished she looked up at him and put her hand on his knee.
"That is my part," she said. "Now wont you tell your part of it, Uom?" He had asked her to call him always "Uom." "I dont know your part yet, and it must be beautiful."
So he told them how, whe alone, ill and dull and irritable, Ram Dass had tried to distract him by describing the passers by, and there was one child who passed oftehan any one else; he had begun to be ied in her--partly perhaps because he was thinking a great deal of a little girl, and partly because Ram Dass had been able to relate the i of his visit to the atti chase of the monkey. He had described its cheerless look, and the bearing of the child, who seemed as if she was not of the class of those who were treated as drudges and servants. Bit by bit, Ram Dass had made discoveries ing the wretess of her life. He had found out how easy a matter it was to climb across the few yards of roof to the skylight, and this fact had been the beginning of all that followed.
"Sahib," he had said one day, "I could cross the slates and make the child a fire when she is out on some errand. Wheurned, wet and cold, to find it blazing, she would think a magi had do."
The idea had been so fanciful that Mr. Carrisfords sad face had lighted with a smile, and Ram Dass had been so filled with rapture that he had enlarged upon it and explaio his master how simple it would be to aplish numbers of other things. He had shown a childlike pleasure and iion, and the preparations for the carrying out of the plan had filled many a day with i which would otherwise have dragged wearily. On the night of the frustrated ba Ram Dass had kept watch, all his packages being in readiness iic which was his own; and the person who was to help him had waited with him, as ied as himself in the odd adventure. Ram Dass had been lying flat upon the slates, looking in at the skylight, when the ba had e to its disastrous clusion; he had been sure of the profoundness of Saras wearied sleep; and then, with a dark lantern, he had crept into the room, while his panion remained outside and hahe things to him. When Sara had stirred ever so faintly, Ram Dass had closed the lantern-slide and lain flat upon the floor. These and many other exg things the children found out by asking a thousand questions.
"I am so glad," Sara said. "I am so glad it was you who were