“She can’t if she’s dead, can she?”
“Well, wait a minute. You always fly off so quick, Dotty. Let me think. Let’s all sit down here and think a minute.”
Dolly pulled the two girls down beside her on a window-seat. They looked at the silent, motionless form. The woman lay on her side, her hands under her. Her feet in old buttoned shoes stuck out beneath a shabby skirt of dark cloth, frayed at the edges. She wore a big, dark coat of rough cloth. Her hat was held on by a thick veil through which they could quite plainly see her face. She had a very white complexion, but very red cheeks, and staring wide-open blue eyes.
Her grey hair was frowsy and half tumbling down, and round her neck was an old black feather boa. Altogether she looked poorly dressed but her face gave promise of being pretty.
“I’ve got to see her better,” declared Dotty, as Dolly’s cogitation had promised no suggestions. “I’ve just simply got to! Maisie, will you help lift her head, if I’ll help?”
“Yes, I will,” said Maisie, decidedly; “I won’t flinch this time.”
Dotty went over and knelt at the woman’s side. Maisie knelt at her head. “Now,” said Dotty, “I’ll put my hands under her shoulders and you put yours beneath her head, and we’ll sit her up. Maybe—well,—maybe she isn’t—you know.”
Gently Dotty put her hand under the old cloth coat, carefully Maisie passed her hand again under the grey hair.
“Now!” said Dotty, and as they lifted, the grey hair came off in Maisie’s hand, and—the head of the woman rolled away from the body! All three girls shrieked, and then Dotty began to scream with laughter.
“Oh!” she cried. “Oh, that naughty little thing! Oh, how could she! Girls, girls, it isn’t a woman, it’s a dummy thing that horrid little Genie fixed up to tease us! She ought to be punished for this! But we were well taken in!”