to the other in the decorated school-room. She looked instead a strange, desolate, almost grotesque little figure.
She had put on, without Mariette's help, the cast-aside black-velvet frock. It was too short and tight, and her slender legs looked long and thin, showing themselves from beneath the brief skirt. As she had not found a piece of black ribbon, her short, thick, black hair tumbled loosely about her face and contrasted strongly with its pallor. She held Emily tightly in one arm, and Emily was swathed in a piece of black material.
"Put down your doll," said Miss Minchin. "What do you mean by bringing her here?"
"No," Sara answered. "I will not put her down. She is all I have. My papa gave her to me."
She had always made Miss Minchin feel secretly uncomfortable, and she did so now. She did not speak with rudeness so much as with a cold steadiness with which Miss Minchin felt it difficult to cope—perhaps because she knew she was doing a heartless and inhuman thing.
"You will have no time for dolls in future," she said.
"You will have to work and improve yourself and make yourself useful."
Sara kept her big, strange eyes fixed on her, and said not a word.
"Everything will be very different now," Miss Minchin went on. "I suppose Miss Amelia has explained matters to you."
"Yes," answered Sara. "My papa is dead. He left me no money. I am quite poor."
