"Oh my, how nice we do look! Now, I do call that just perfect!" The child's face was glowing with health and happiness, her eyes were beaming with affection, and eager for sympathy.

Could she possibly be the little ill-used, runaway waif who had come to her door starving, only so short a time ago?
Mrs.Perry asked herself the question as she looked at her, and in her heart thanked God for sending her this blessing, this chance to help another; and for staying her tongue when she had felt tempted to bid her begone.
Across her mind too flashed the thought of what might have happened to Huldah, if she had turned her away that night.

Would it have been to the workhouse, or the jail she would have drifted,--this bonnie, healthy, smiling child?
But her mind was drawn back to healthier thoughts by Huldah's little brown work-worn hands.
"Don't you like it, ma'am ?" she was asking, troubled by the gravity on Mrs.Perry's face.
"Like it!" she cried, coming back to the present with glad relief.
"I should think I did, and you in it, too, dear!" and for the first time in her life she stooped and kissed the little maiden, and Huldah returned the kiss with all the warmth of her affectionate heart welling up to her lips.
It was the first time anyone had kissed her since her mother died, and the first time that she had kissed anyone but Dick and Charlie..