Caroline looked at her questioningly.
“I mean Miss Fisher,” said naughty Jacqueline mincingly. “The piece of cheese I’m traveling with.”
“You mean the lady in the blue dress?” asked Caroline.
Jacqueline nodded and cuddled Mildred to her. She looked quite gentle until she smiled, and then the imps of mischief crinkled in her eyes.
“Auntie Blair changed at Chicago for Montreal, and I’m to go East with Miss Fisher that she knew ages ago in college. She’s a fuss. She didn’t want me to speak to you. And she’s not my aunt or anything. I shall talk to you as long as I want to.”
Caroline longed to say: “Please do!” She was fascinated with this bold little girl, who used words her mother had never let her utter, and was afraid of nobody, not even the black porter or the august conductor. But she hardly dared say: “Please do!” She only smiled vaguely and picked a small chocolate-covered nut from the satin box.
“Do you go to school?” Jacqueline asked abruptly.
“Oh, yes,” stammered Caroline. “I’ll go into the sixth grade in September. That is, I would have gone into it. I don’t know what school I’ll be in, where I’m going.”
“Do you like school?”
Caroline looked dubious.