"Why don't you do some more burnt-work instead?" suggested Katie.
"I'm out of leather. The last lot I sent for hasn't come."
"You might read to us while we work," suggested Betty. "There's a new _St. Nicholas_ on the table."
"Yes, do," insisted Allison. "Mother said this morning that she thought it would be a fine plan for us to take up some good book and read it in turn while we work."
As all the girls agreed, Ida picked up the magazine and began turning the leaves.
"What will you have?" she asked. "This scientific article doesn't look very entertaining, and this football story wouldn't interest anybody but boys. We can't plunge into the middle of this serial without having read the first chapters, and, judging from the illustrations and the name of this girl's story, it is anything but wildly exciting."
She glanced hastily over the remaining pages, and then laid the magazine aside. "I wonder," she said, hesitatingly, "if any of you have ever read a book I have in my room, called 'The Fortunes of Daisy Dale.' It's the sweetest thing; I nearly cried my eyes out over part of it. Of course it's a novel, and some people object to them unless they're by some great writer like Thackeray or Scott. I know my aunt does. But I don't see how this could hurt anybody. It's about a dear little English girl whose guardian kept her almost like a prisoner, so that he could use her money. She had such a hard time that she ran away and got a place as a governess when she was only sixteen. She had all sorts of trouble and misunderstandings, but it ends happily. All the way through she has such a beautiful influence on young Lord Rokeby and Guy Wolvering, the squire's son, who is so wild that his father threatens to disinherit him. It is his love for her that finally reforms him. Her influence over him is a living illustration of the motto of our club."
"Then let's read it," proposed Allison, eagerly.
"Oh, yes, go get it, Ida," called Lloyd and Kitty in the same breath.
"That is, if you don't mind reading it twice yourself," added Betty.
"No, indeed!" answered Ida, rising. "I could read it a dozen times and never tire of it."
In a moment she was back from her room, carrying the book in one hand and dragging a rocking-chair behind her with the other. She drew it up to one of the windows, and pushing the curtains farther aside, sat down and began to read, to the pattering accompaniment of the rain-drops on the pane. She was a good reader, the best in the seminary, and her well modulated voice would have lent a charm to any story; but the expression she threw into this made it seem as if she were recounting her own personal troubles.
