I stepped on a piece of glass, and it went right through my
shoe. But it's stopped bleeding now."
"Do you know this little girl?" asked Betty. "We found her down the road,
but she can't seem to tell us where she lives. First she points in one
direction and then the other, and--"
"And we can't understand about her two mothers," broke in Mollie. "Do,
please, if you can, straighten it out. Do you know her?"
"Yes, ma'am," answered the boy peddler, and his voice was pleasant. He
took off a rather ragged cap politely, and stood up on one foot, resting
the cut one on the rock. "She's Nellie Burton, and she lives about a
mile down that way," and he pointed in the direction from which the
girls had come.
"I live dere sometimes," spoke the child, "and sometimes down dere," and
she indicated two directions. "I dot two muvvers."
"What in the world does she mean?" asked Mollie, hopelessly.
"That's what she always says," spoke the boy. "She calls one of her aunts
her mamma--it's her mother's sister, you see. She lives about a mile from
Nellie's house, and Nellie spends about as much time at one place as she
does at the other. She always says she has two mothers."
"I _has_" announced the child, calmly, accepting another chocolate
from Grace.
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