“I see how ’twas.  You knowed this place before we come here.  We been here two year come next Christmas.  Done bought the place.  Fust time any of our folks is ever owned land.  Always been renters and share-hands, movin’ to new places soon as we wore out ol’ ones.  I tell my ol’ man it’s goin’ to come mighty hard on him now that he’s got a place of his own that’s got to be tooken care of.”

By this time, the color had come back to Anne’s face and she was smiling and stroking the sleek black-and-white cat that had jumped in her lap.

“What is the little girl’s name, mammy?” asked Lizzie.  Having finished her supper, she was standing at her mother’s side, staring with wide eyes at Anne and shyly rolling a corner of her apron in her fingers.

“Sh-sh-sh,” whispered Mrs. Collins. “’Tain’t perlite to ask questions.  You make her cry again.—­But, Peter, I’m worried to think maybe her folks is missed her and lookin’ for her.  You have to take the lantern presen’ly and go and tell ’em she’s here.”

“Whar is I gwine?  And who I gwi’ tell?” asked Mr. Collins.

“Peter Collins, you is the most unreasonable man I ever see in my life!  You sho ain’t goin’ to worry the po’ little thing and make her cry again, askin’ all kinds of questions.  You jest got to hunt up her folks.  They’ll be worried to death, missing a child like this, and at night, too.”

But Anne was now ready to explain cheerfully.  “I haven’t any folks—­not any real folks of my own now,” she said.  “Mother is dead and father is dead.  Uncle Carey got lost, I reckon.  I used to live here.  Mr. Patterson took me to a—­a orphan ’sylum, Mrs. Marshall calls it.  The name over the door is ‘Home for Girls.’  This evening I was on the train with Mrs. Marshall and I knew the place when we came to the water-tank.  And I wanted to be here.  So we came, Honey-Sweet and I. I thought the dog was going to bite me.”

“You hear that, Peter Collins?” exclaimed Mrs. Collins.  “Now wasn’t that smart of her?  She knowed the place and got off the train by herself and come right up to the house.  And Red Coat might ‘a’ bit the po’ child traipsin’ ’long in the dark.  You got to shut that dog up nights,” she said, as if every evening was to bring a little lost Anne wandering into danger.  “To think of puttin’ a po’ little motherless, fatherless thing in a ‘sylum,” she continued.  “Many homes as thar is in this world!—­Le’ me fry you another plateful of nice brown cakes, honey, and get you some damson preserves—­maybe you like them better’n sweetmeats.  Or would you choose raspberry jam?” She had thrown open the diamond-paned doors of the bookcase, now used as a pantry, and was looking over the rows of jars.

“I couldn’t eat another mouthful of anything; indeed, I couldn’t,” insisted Anne.

“I wish you would,” sighed Mrs. Collins.  “It gives me a feelin’ to see yo’ po’ thin little face—­no wider’n a knitting needle.”