that Judith usually wished on, but she could wish on the moon to-night; Norah had told her so; wish once instead of three nights running, and get her wish whether she thought of the red fox's tail or not. The new moon of May was a wishing moon.

A wishing moon! The small white figure on the steps cuddled itself into a smaller heap. Judith sighed happily and closed her eyes. She was going with the others. She had her wish already.

It was Judith's great trouble that she was not like other little girls. Until she was six Judith had a vague idea that she was the only child in the world. Then she tried to make friends with two small, dirty girls over the back fence, and found out that there were other children, but she must not play with them. One day Norah found her crying in the nursery because she could not think what to play, and soon after Willard Nash,[Pg 7] the fat little boy next door, came to dinner and into her life, and after that, Eddie and Natalie Ward, from the white house up the street, and Lorena Drew, from over the river. Still other children came to her parties, so many that she could not remember their names. Then Judith's trouble began. She was not like them.

[Pg 7]

She did not look like them; her clothes were not made by a seamstress, but came from city shops, and had shorter skirts, and stuck out in different places. She could not do what they did; Mollie called for her at nine at evening parties, and she usually had to go to bed half an hour after dinner, before it was dark. She had to do things that they did not do: make grown-up calls with her mother and wear gloves, and take lessons in fancy dancing instead of going to dancing school.

But she had gone to school now for almost a year, a private school in the big billiard-room at the Larribees', but a real school, with other children in it. They did not make fun of her clothes, or the way she pronounced her words, very often now. She belonged to a secret society with Rena and Natalie. She had spent one night with Natalie, though she had to come home before breakfast. The other children did not know she was different, but Judith knew.

Unexpected things might be required of her at[Pg 8] a moment's notice: to be excused from school and pass cakes at a tea at the Everards'; to leave a picnic before the potatoes were roasted, because Mollie had appeared, inexorable; unaccountable things, but she was to be safe to-night. May night was not such a wonderful night for any little girl as it was for Judith.

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