She asked Miss Jennings the question, but she was looking straight at Faith.  There was a gleam in her eye that was very unpleasant.

“What news, Maggie?” asked Miss Jennings, noticing the look at once.  She knew the girl’s disposition, and almost dreaded what was coming.

“Old Forbes was robbed of five hundred dollars!  Some one stole it from his desk early yesterday morning.  There’s pretty good proof already as to who was the thief.  I wouldn’t stand in her shoes for double the money!”

She was still watching Faith with her eyes half closed.  Miss Jennings was too shrewd to be deceived a minute as to her actual meaning.

“Well, you’ll save yourself trouble by keeping your mouth shut,” she said, crossly, “it dont pay to meddle with such matters as that, Maggie, especially if you happen to be living under a cloud yourself.  Somebody might take a notion to turn the tables on you, you know.  I’d as as soon be a thief as some other things I might mention.”

There was a sneer in her tones that was unmistakable.  Faith turned just in time to catch its full meaning.

“Oh, you needn’t preach!” cried the other angrily.  “Any one can see you’re fairly green with envy, eighty-nine!  You’d give a whole lot to be able to flirt with the boys, but, as Jim Denton says, you are too pale and skinny!”

“For shame!”

It was Faith who spoke the words.  She was facing the brazen-faced girl with her eyes blazing angrily.

“How dare you speak like that to a poor, sick girl?  Have you no heart in your bosom, no decency or conscience!  It does not seem possible to me that girls can be so hateful toward each other.  Are we not all sisters, who have been commanded to love one another?”

There was silence for just a second as Faith finished speaking, then a loud, coarse laugh broke from Maggie Brady’s lips.

“Oh, Lord!  Hear her, girls!  Hear the little preacher in petticoats!  Isn’t she eloquent, the pretty thing!  Why, she ought to be a corporal in the Salvation Army!”

There was a roar of laughter at the rude girl’s words, during which Miss Jennings caught Faith by the arm and half dragged her from the cloak-room.

“Come, Faith, let us go!  This is no place for you.  That girl is the most brazen hussy in the whole establishment, and that’s saying a good deal, as you’ll find out later!”

They hurried out into the street as quickly as possible.  Faith was almost crying with indignation when they reached the sidewalk.

“Now, brace up, dear; it’s all over for to-day,” said Miss Jennings.  “You’ll soon get used to it; that’s exactly what every one of us have had to go through with, but the girls are not all like Mag; there are lots of nice ones.  She wasn’t so bad, either, until Jim Denton noticed her.”

“Is he her sweetheart?” asked Faith as soon as she could control her voice.  “I heard them talking together and I am sure she loves him.”