“Edward,” said her mother,—­what music there was in her voice!—­“if you are going after that dear child, you’d better take a shawl to wrap her in, for it is snowing fast.  And be sure to tell her we love her dearly, every one of us, and don’t believe she will ever run away again.”

“O, was her papa going after her?  Did they love her, after all?  Were they willing to keep her in the house?”

Dotty opened the door before she knew it.  “O, mamma, mamma!” cried she, rushing into her mother’s arms.

“Why, Dotty, you darling child, where did you come from?” exclaimed Mrs. Parlin, in great surprise, kissing the little, dirty girl, and taking her right to her heart, in spite of the coal-dust.

“If you’ll let me stay at home,” gasped Dotty, “if you’ll let me stay at home, I’ll live in the kitchen, and won’t go near the table.”

“Where did you come from?” said Mr. Parlin, kissing a clean place on Dotty’s black face, and laughing under his breath.

“I came through the cellar window, papa.”

“Through the cellar window, child?”

“Yes, papa; I didn’t s’pose you’d care!”

“Care!  My dear, your mother is the one to care!  Just look at your stockings!”

“There was coal there, thrown in,” said Dotty, with a quivering lip; “and I had to walk over it, and under it, and through it.”

“Was my little daughter afraid to come in by the door?”

“I didn’t know’s you wanted me, papa.

“I thought you’d say, ‘What strange child is this?’”

Mr. Parlin, looking at the black streaks on Dotty’s woeful face, found it very difficult to keep from laughing.  “A strange child’ she appeared to be, certainly.

“But I’d got my visit all finished up, ever and ever so long ago.”

“So you really chose to come back to us, my dear?”

“O, papa, you don’t know!  Did you think, did you s’pose—­”

Here Dotty broke down completely, and, seizing her father’s shirt-bosom in both her grimy hands, she buried her face in it, and sprinkled it with tears of ink.

There was great surprise throughout the house when Dotty’s arrival became known.

“We didn’t know how to live without you any longer,” said Prudy; “and tomorrow Thanksgiving Day.”

“But I never should have come up,” said Dotty, “if I hadn’t heard mamma talk about loving me just the same; I never could have come up.”

“Excuse me for smiling,” said Prudy; “but you look as if you had fallen into the inkstand.  It is so funny!”

Dotty was not at all amused herself; but after she was dressed in clean clothes, she felt very happy, and enjoyed her supper remarkably well.  The thought that they “didn’t know how to live without her” gave a relish to every mouthful.

It was a delightful evening to the little wanderer.  The parlor looked so cheerful in the rosy firelight that Dotty thought she “would like to kiss every single thing in the room.”  It was unpleasant out of doors, and the wind blew as if all the people in the world were deaf, and must be made to hear; but Dotty did not mind that.  She looked out of the window, and said to Prudy,—­