“But you have two such beautiful braids.” “Jessie’s curled a little but it was so thin mother kept cutting it. Dear me! You wouldn’t catch me soaping and brushing the curl out of it if mine curled,” declared May.
They had a rather merry time at dinner and the children did not seem a bit afraid to talk, though they were not aggressive. But Dr. Richards thought his little ward compared very favorably with the others. Her daintiness suggested Miss Armitage, he fancied. 270
They sat a long while over their dessert of fruit and nuts, and then the guest said he would have to go as he wanted to attend a lecture by an eminent surgeon. He would be in tomorrow morning.
“I thought I would take Marilla out shopping with me. Come in to dinner again and spend the whole evening.”
Dr. Richards promised to.
The others went up to the sitting room. Mr. Warren took possession of the big Morris chair, May had one knee, Jessie the other and Edith seated herself on the broad arm and placed her arm over her father’s shoulder. They always exacted an hour of their father and he gave it with the utmost fondness.
“And here is a place for you, little Marilla,” he said. “Now the chair is full. I’ve wondered sometimes if Edith wouldn’t tip us over.”
“I’d have to be as fat as Auntie Belle to do that,” she laughed, “and now papa I want Marilla to tell you about a queer Home she was put in where they wouldn’t let the little girls have dolls nor playthings, and they made dollies out of clothes pins and had to hide them.” 271
“That was cruel to little girls. Why they have dolls by right and no one should prevent them. Didn’t you play any?”
“Oh yes, out of doors, tag and Uncle John and Scotland’s burning, and Lady Jane, and Ring around a Rosy; and then in summer you had to pull weeds in the garden. When it rained you had to march in doors, but if you tried to dance a little you had to go and sit down. Oh, they were very strict.”