Little Maid Marian

. After all, there were pleasant things opening up. What if she could not move mountains, there would be fresh cookies to-morrow and out of somewhere a beautiful young lady was advancing toward her, not exactly a playfellow, maybe, but some one much younger than Grandpa and Grandma Otway.

CHAPTER II

The School-Teacher

The brick house had not the cheerful air of Mrs. Hunt's white-boarded, green-shuttered abode. It was set back a few feet from the side-walk, but a brick wall on each side shut out any glimpse of the flower garden, and the iron railing leading up from the flight of steps gave the place an air unlike the rest of the village houses. Upon the top step Dorothy Robbins stood a few moments before she rang the bell. She cast an upward glance at the windows first; the shutters were all bowed and silence reigned everywhere. She wondered what was behind the brick wall, and if the inmates of the house would look as forbidding and inhospitable as the house itself.