"But you aren't fat, with a turned-up nose and just a little thin straight pigtail of hair.

You're pretty, and an artist, and you're going to be somebody some day.

But I'm just plain 'little Mary,' with no talents or _anything_!" Choking with tears, she rushed out of the room, and took refuge in the swing down by the beehives.

For once the "School of the Bees" failed to whisper a comforting lesson.

This was a trouble which she could not seal up in its cell, and for many days it poisoned all life's honey.
Presently she slipped back into the house for a pencil and box of paper, and sitting on the swing with her geography on her knees for a writing-table, she poured out her troubles in a letter to Jack.