When Gretel Was Fifteen

Miss Minton’s hand trembled slightly, as she laid down the evening paper, but otherwise she showed no sign of unusual emotion. There was a moment of dead silence, and every face...

It was Easter Sunday. Such a strange Easter, quite unlike any the girls had ever known before, for though the world was bathed in bright spring sunshine, and a robin was singing...

It was the fourteenth of June, and “Breaking-Up” day at Miss Minton’s. For more than two months the United States had been at war with Germany, and during that time many things...

It was four o’clock, and Gretel was at the piano in the dismantled drawing-room, playing softly to herself. The afternoon had been, on the whole, a pleasant one. She had spent a...

It was on the following Monday morning that the invitation came. Gretel found it awaiting her on the breakfast table, and at once recognized Molly Chester’s rather straggly hand...

The Chester family were all gathered on the broad piazza when Gretel and Geraldine came down-stairs dressed for dinner. Jerry had also reappeared and was deeply absorbed in conv...

“Mother wants to know if any one would like to go into New London with her,” said Molly, coming into Gretel’s and Geraldine’s room, on the following Saturday afternoon. “She’s g...

Jerry Barlow swung himself down from the piazza railing, from whence he had been watching the departure of a sailboat filled with Sunday pleasure-seekers, and joined his sister...

It was the glorious Fourth. The boys had been celebrating since early morning, when they had aroused the household by setting off a pack of giant crackers on the front lawn. The...

Notwithstanding the unusually late hours of the night before, the Chester household was astir early the next morning. Mr. Chester and Gretel were to take the eight-thirty train...

Gretel started to her feet, with a wild, half-formed idea of making her escape, but the portly form of Mr. Becker stood between her and the door, and she sat down again, feeling...

They were having a merry evening at the Chesters’. Stephen Cranston and Jimmy Fairfax had come to dinner, and later, Ada Godfrey and her friends, including the objectionable Arc...

Mrs. Barlow’s tone was plaintive, as she lifted her head from the sofa cushions in her darkened bedroom. Geraldine turned from the open window, where she had been trying to peep...

How long she had lived in that dark, stifling little room and slept on that hard mattress on the floor, Gretel had no idea. Was it days, months or years? Sometimes she felt as i...

It was very pleasant in the Douaines’ garden that lovely September afternoon, and so Gretel thought, as she lay back in her steamer-chair, under the big apple-tree, and gazed ou...