"But they are not all little at once."
"No," laughed Doris. "I should like to be somewhere in the middle. Babies are so cunning, when they don't cry."
Miss Recompense smiled at that.
There was a comfortable low chair for Doris, and Uncle Win found her seated there, the ruddy firelight throwing up her face like a painting. Miss Recompense went out to see about the supper. There was a good-natured black woman in the kitchen to do the cooking, and Cato, who did the outside work and waited on Dinah and Miss Recompense—a tall, sedate, rather pompous colored man.
Some indefinable charm about the house appealed to Doris. The table was arranged in such an attractive manner. Nothing could be more delightful than Aunt Elizabeth's cooking, but she stopped short at an invisible something. The china was saved for company, though there was one pretty cup they always gave to Aunt Priscilla. The everyday dishes were earthen, such as ordinary people used, and being of rather poor glaze they soon checked. Doris knew these pretty plates and the tall cream jug and sugar dish had not been brought out especially for her, though she had supposed they were when they all came over to a company tea.
She started so when Uncle Winthrop addressed her in French, and glanced at him in amaze; then turned to a pink glow and laughed as she collected her scattered wits to answer.
What a soft, exquisite accent the child had! Miss Recompense paused in her pouring tea to listen.
Uncle Win smiled and continued. They were around the pretty tea table in a sort of triangle. Uncle Win passed the thin, dainty slices of bread. Miss Recompense, when she was done with the tea, passed the cold chicken. Then there were cheese and two kinds of preserves, plain cake and fruit cake.
Children rarely drank tea, so Doris had some milk in a glass which was cut with just a sparkle here and there that the light caught and made brilliant.
"How you can understand any such talk as that beats me," said Miss Recompense in a sort of helpless fashion as she glanced from one to the other.