Page:By Sanction of Law.pdf/38

 nose against Lida's hand in a friendly way.

"There, now!" whispered Miss Gregory. "You're surely one of the family. See! Mopsie has adopted you and he's very particular as to his friendships. There aren't five girls in the school with whom he's on such friendly terms as he is with you at this moment."

Involuntarily the girl's hand moved over the fur of the cat's back and smiles replaced the tears. The cat, as if to prove his entire friendliness turned then lay down contentedly on Lida's arm to sleep under the stroking of the girl's hand.

"Well, I never!" exclaimed Miss Gregory. "I'll soon be jealous of you, Miss Lauriston. Mopsie never sleeps in any arm but mine." With that she kissed the girl tenderly on the cheek again. Lida held the hand to her cheek as she replied:

"I love you. You're kind and your kiss was just like my mother's used to be."

"You poor child!" was all Miss Gregory could say, though her heart was full of tenderness. "What you need is loving—and you'll have it."

As she spoke a flood of full harvest moonlight filled the room, enveloping the three, it seemed a place of enchantment and in this enchantment Lida soon slumbered her lonesomeness forgotten while the elderly woman's thoughts retraced the years to the time when she was a girl at school, her mind as flooded with the memories as the room was of moonlight. As the girl slept she tiptoed gently from the room back to her own apartment where she sat