Mrs. Rosenberg was so severe and unreasonable, that her little daughter, through fear of her, had learned to deceive.  Still Mrs. Rosenberg loved Mandoline, and would have been a better mother, perhaps, if she had only known how, and had not had so much work to do.

Presently she went down stairs, and left the little girls together.

“Good!” said Lina, in a low voice.  “She’s gone; now we’ll play.”

“But you can’t knit if you play, Lina.  Tell me where you hided my hat, ’cause I want to go home.”

“You shan’t go home till after supper, you little darling Dotty Dimple.”

“O, but I must go, for my mother doesn’t know where I am,” said Dotty, in a dreary tone.  She had no longer any curiosity regarding Jewish suppers; all she wanted was the liberty to get away.  But it is always easier to fall into a trap than to get out of it.  Mandoline would not produce the missing hat, and it was no light matter for Dotty to go down stairs, among the noisy, quarrelsome children, and beg the severe Mrs. Rosenberg to take her part.  If she did so, perhaps the woman would pelt her with the steel thimble.  Perhaps, too, she would say Mandoline might keep the hat.  So Dotty played “synagogue,” and all the while the sun was dropping down, down the sky, as if it had a leaden weight attached to it, to make it go faster.

CHAPTER VI.

A STRANGE VISIT.

The same warfare of words continued to come up from the kitchen, and presently the odor of sausages stole up, too; Mrs. Rosenberg was preparing supper.  It seemed to the impatient Dotty that she was a long while about it; but she worked as fast as she could, with so many children clinging to her skirts, and impeding her movements.

“Supper, Mandoline!” called she at last, in a shrill voice; and the little girls went down.

The supper was palatable enough, but very unwholesome, and the table-cloth was dirty and wrinkled.

“You don’t seem to like my cooking,” said Mrs. Rosenberg, with a displeased glance at Dotty’s full plate.

“Yes’m,” replied the little guest, faintly; “but I’ve eaten up my appetite.”

At the same time she swallowed a little oily gravy in desperation, and looked slyly to see if Solly was watching her.  Yes, he was, and so were all the rest of the family, as if she had been a peculiar kind of animal, just caught and caged.

“I suppose they are dreadful nice folks at your house,” continued Mrs. Rosenberg.  “I almost wonder your mother let you come here to play with my poor little girl.  Mandy’s just as good as you are, though,—­you can tell her so,—­and she’s got a sight prettier eyes.”

Dotty’s heart kept swelling and swelling, till presently it seemed as if there wasn’t room enough in her whole body to hold it.  She thought of the cheerful, orderly tea-table at home; she recalled her mother’s gentle ways, her lovely face, and longed to kiss her cheek, and whisper, “Forgive me.”