Jacqueline turned in the plush seat and looked at her, much impressed.
“You’re a funny kid,” she said. “How can anybody’s name be like a trumpet?”
“But names are all music and things,” the little girl in gingham insisted. “That’s why I don’t care for Caroline. It’s like a bushel of wheat. Muzzy always called me Carol. That’s a nice name—like Christmas trees, and snow outside, and yellow candles.”
“Is your mother with you?” asked Jacqueline.
“No,” Caroline answered, and made herself very busy with Mildred’s nightdress. “My mother is—dead.”
“Oh!” said Jacqueline blankly, and seemed for a moment unable to think of anything else to say.
“She died last winter,” Caroline went on, in her patient little voice. “That’s why I’m going to my half-aunt Martha. Have you—lost somebody, too? I see you’re wearing black.”
“Oh, that’s just not to show dirt,” Jacqueline explained. “But I haven’t any mother nor father. They died ages ago. Aunt Edie takes care of me, and Judge Blair is my guardian. Have you got a father?”
Caroline shook her head.
“Daddy died three years ago when everybody had the flu. He was on a newspaper. My mother gave music lessons. We had a room with the piano in it, and a gas flat we cooked breakfast on, and a couch that pulled out and made a bed for us both.”