be her play-room. She was all ready for a good cry, and she closed the door. Then she thought, what if Mr. John were to see her crying like a girl-baby!—and she marched to the window, and through the dimness in her eyes tried to see something cheering. Her nature was very social, and her need of companionship great at that moment; so she turned to the friend who had been brother, sister and child to her through most of her little girlhood—her big doll Helena, who sat in a chair in the corner beholding her agitation with fixed, compassionless gaze.

"Come here, you dear," said Mollie, folding her tenderly in her arms and finding comfort in the contact of her cold china cheek. She had loved her so long that she had given her a soul; and to Mollie's heart the doll was as fit for loving as if she had had breath and speech. She did not play with her any longer, but Helena was still her dear old friend—an almost human confidant and crony.

As she held her closely, suddenly she thought of Mr. John. If he had objected to the petting of babies, what would he say to dolls? She gave her a frantic kiss, put her away, and turned her back on her to reflect; for she did not mean to shirk the most disagreeable reflections in the new line of duty she had chosen to follow.

If it had really been a human friend whose destinies Mollie considered, she could not have been more serious; and if it had been a human friend whom she at last decided must be put far from her, she could hardly have suffered severer heart-pangs. But she would have no compromising with inclination in this matter. She would be brave and strong, as it became her mother's son to be. So to the lowest depths of the deepest trunk in the garret she mentally consigned Helena. There, beyond the reach of her loving eyes and arms, she should lie in banishment until her heart became callous.

But there was something so repulsive in the idea of smothering human Helena under layers of old garments, that Mollie finally thought of a better way. Helena should no longer be Helena, dear to her heart in all her little feminine adornings and her sympathetic, tender traits of character. She should undergo a change; a radical reform. She, too, should become a boy, and her name should be Thomas. Thenceforth Mollie spent her leisure moments in manufacturing garments suitable for the change; and at last she saw a boy-doll, in roundabout and pantaloons, occupying the chair where Helena had so long sat in dainty dresses. The sight was a perpetual offense to her eyes; but she bore it bravely, keeping in store for herself a reward of merit in Mr. John's approval. She did not fail to mention to him Helena's reform the next time they met, which was one morning before breakfast. She was sweeping the front steps when he came and leaned over the fence and called her.

She shouldered the broom, as she had seen men shoulder implements of labor,—hoes, rakes, etc.,—and tramped toward him. Mr. John watched her, with an expression of disgust under his mustache.

"Well, Bob," he said, "I'm glad to see you out so early. Form good habits before you're grown, and when you come to manhood you'll make money by it. Where are your Bloomers to-day? It isn't possible your mind's not made up to them yet?"

There was something in Mr. John's tone and manner which did not seem quite courteous to Mollie; but she had hardly hung her head when he began to talk in his old half-fatherly, half-brotherly fashion; and then, in the lively conversation, she found a chance to introduce Thomas. Mr. John gave her a long, solemn, searching look.

"Mollie," he said, "I am very much afraid you will never succeed as a boy. It seems to me that even an ordinarily masculine girl of your age would have been clear-headed enough to see the absurdity of your little farce. It is nothing but a farce, mere babyishness. You have been playing with yourself and with your doll. No boy could have done it."

There was a short pause; then Mollie's voice piped out into a humble question as to what course a boy would have pursued in the matter.

"Why, that is clear enough," said Mr. John. "If you want to do what a boy would do, dispose of the doll on the shortest notice. Get it out of your sight and mind as soon as possible, and then never give it any more thought than you'd give the rattle you used to shake when you were a baby, or the rubber ring you cut your teeth on."

Could he be made to understand the immense difference between Helena and other toys? Could any words explain to him about the soul that had grown out of Mollie's love into the cloth and sawdust body? Mollie looked up to catch a sympathetic expression that should help her to tell him; but she did not find it.

"You don't understand," she said desperately.

"No?" said he.

"Mr. John," said Mollie, not looking him in the eye, "when you have a doll as long as I have had Helena, it is only natural that she should seem to you like a live person. If I didn't play with her at all, she'd seem real to me, and I shouldn't like to have her go away any more than I would mother."

"Which tells the secret that you have some sort of human fondness for the lifeless bundle of rags," said Mr. John, "and proves what I feared, that you are a very weak-minded little girl, Mollie."

"You wont believe in me at all," said Mollie. [page 10] "You wont think I am doing my best, and that I ever succeed. You are not like you used to be."

"That naturally follows your being different," said Mr. John. "Of course, we can't have the same feelings toward each other now as when you were contented to be a little girl and to let me treat you as one. I'm sorry you don't find me as agreeable as before, Mollie; but you must acknowledge that I am acting as a friend in doing all that I can to help you in your dear project."

"It isn't dear!" burst forth Mollie, indignantly. "I hate it!—but I'll never give it up!"

"Of course not," Mr. John said. "Then I presume you are all ready to part with Helena."

"I'll go and get her," said Mollie.

No one saw the parting in the play-room. It was quickly over, and she was back by the fence.

"Give her to Bessie," said Mollie, putting Helena and her wardrobe into Mr. John's arms. Bessie was one of his many nieces.

"To Bessie!" said he. "Where you can feel that she is away on a visit; where you know that she will be petted and cared for; where you can see her occasionally. If you are sincere in this matter, Mollie, send her off where you can no longer care to think of her. Our ash-man would be very glad to carry her home to his little girls."

Mollie's hands made a wild dive toward Helena as a vision of the little grimy man who crept into their areas for ashes rose before her.

"Decide now," said Mr. John. "Take your doll and be Mollie Kelly again, or be a boy and give her to the ash-man's children without a pang."

Mollie hung her head. There was color coming and going in her cheeks, her fingers trembled,—how they longed to snatch Helena!—and her mind was full of indecision. Mr. John watched her closely, and he thought he saw the tide turning in favor of her girlhood. He held the doll nearer that it might tempt her fingers; but, on the instant, she turned and ran away. He tucked Helena under his coat and carried her upstairs and locked her in a drawer, there to abide until Mollie should want her again.

That was a gloomy day to Mollie. She was out of humor with her boyhood. She was ashamed of herself one moment for bewailing Helena, and furious the next with Mr. John and the ash-man. She felt cross and discouraged, and was glad when the darkness came, and she could go to bed and sleep. But the next morning she was in no cheerier, braver frame of mind; and she walked home at noon, considering plain sewing versus book-keeping as a means of subsistence. Mr. John would have rejoiced if he could have seen his "little leaven" working.

"The gutters on the roof are full of