“Of course I shall not hang them,” said Cordelia, firmly.  “And I shall not buy a doll for Susie, for my father always buys her one.  I was going to brag about her having two,” she added candidly.  “And I shall not buy the silk handkerchiefs.  They have the issue cotton ones and some other ones that my father bought;” and she withdrew her eyes from the display of cheap and gaudy handkerchiefs of so-called silk material suspended from the wire.  “I shall buy a cake pan with a steeple for my mother, and a hairbrush for my father, for his hairs stick up so straight and stiff.  And I shall give the presents very still at camp, so the school will not be jealous.”

Having thus subdued her vanity, Cordelia Running Bird shyly bought the articles she had selected from the trader’s boy, who helped his father in the store.  She also bought four hair ribbons and a little bag of candy, having left two silver quarters.  She was considering how to spend them when her eyes alighted on some little brown shoes and a pair of stockings matching them, beneath a small glass show-case.

“Ver-r-y st-y-lish little shoes and stockings!” she exclaimed, forgetting in her rapture to be shy before the trader’s boy.

The small girls crowded upon tiptoe at the show-case, peering through the glass sides to inspect the little wonders.

“Just the color of an Indian,” observed a little maid of seven, holding up her slim hand to compare it with the red-brown shoes and stockings.  “But they made them for a little white girl.  They are like the ones the little white visitor with the pink dress wore last summer.”

“They are just as pretty for a little Indian girl,” replied Cordelia.  “They would be just right for Susie,” with a longing eye.

“But Susie does not need them,” said the prudent little girl.  “She has a black shoes and stockings in your cupboard that are very nice.”

“But she could have two pairs.  These would be so pretty with the red dress in the Jack Frost song.  She could wear the black ones with the blue dress,” said Cordelia, seized anew with her besetting sin and growing helpless in its grasp.

She asked the number of the shoes, finding it the same that Susie wore.  Then she asked the price.  She could buy the shoes and stockings for a dollar and a half.

“One dollar more than I have got,” she said in feverish regret.  She was intently silent for a little, then she turned, and, running quickly to the school-teacher, drew her to one side, where they could talk unheard.

“The Indian doll my grandmother made for me is very nice and new, for I have kept it in my trunk so much.  I will give it to you if you please to give me one dollar—­that is what they gave my grandmother for her dolls when she would sell them at the agency,” Cordelia said, in eager undertone.

“Why, child, you surely cannot wish to sell your Indian doll that has a beaded buckskin dress just like the one your grandmother wore when she was your age?” said the school-teacher in surprise.  “No, thank you, dear.  You wish to give me pleasure, but I cannot accept it, for I know you love the little Indian grandmother better than you could the prettiest white doll in the Christmas box,” she added, gratefully.