Beth hung her head.  “I’m awfully sorry, but I’ve spent all my money.”

Marian looked at her in surprise.  “Why, Beth Davenport, how is that?”

Beth seated herself upon the floor.  “Well, Marian, you know both you and I decided to buy mamma’s birthday present before the Fair began for fear we wouldn’t have anything left to buy it with.  Well, after that I had only a dollar.”

“But that dollar was to last you all the week.”

Beth took down a brush and brushed out the snarls while she talked.

“Yes, I know it was, but you see, Marian, Julia and Harvey were with me to-day.  They were my guests.  Papa gave me the tickets to take them.  Well, it was dreadfully hot, and we did want some ice cream awfully, so I asked them to have some.  There was thirty cents gone.”

Marian looked judicial.  “Well, what about the other seventy?”

Beth brushed snarls so vigorously that she winced once or twice.

“Well, you may think me dreadfully foolish, but I invited them to the Punch and Judy show.  That took thirty cents more.”

“Well, but you still should have forty cents.”

Beth stopped brushing and clasped her hands.

“Well, I just couldn’t help it.  I—­well, this is how it happened.  You know papa gave Gustus tickets for the Fair for himself, his brothers and sisters, and mamma let him have the afternoon off.  Well, just as we came out of the Punch and Judy show we met them.  You know mamma gives Gustus clothes, but the others looked dreadfully ragged.  I stopped and spoke to them and asked them if they were going into the show.  Marian, tears came into Gustus’s eyes, as he said, ’Missy Beth, the likes of us don’t go to shows.  I’se never been to a show in my life.’”

“Never been to a show in his life?  How was that, Beth?”

“That was just what I asked him, Marian.  I knew mamma paid him for waiting on us.  He told me that he took all his money to his mother.  Marian, I just couldn’t help it.  I spent my last forty cents for four Punch and Judy tickets for four of them, and Harvey and Julia bought some for the others.  Do you think we were foolish?”

Marian hesitated for an instant.

“I suppose I should have done the same thing in your place.  I am awfully sorry, though, you haven’t any money to lend me.”

“Maybe my dress and cake will take prizes.  Then I’ll have some to lend you.”

Beth could hardly wait for the last day of the exhibition to see if she would be awarded any prize.  She thought that nothing could mar her happiness if she received one.

The prices were decided upon on Friday night, but were not to be made public until Saturday morning.  Beth was up bright and early, therefore, on Saturday.  She was all impatience to be through breakfast that she might learn her fate, but she found that she might as well possess her soul in patience, as Maggie proved provoking, and would not hurry in the least.