“No, never!”
“Well, that’s where we live.”
“Do you?” gasped the little boy. “Oh, do tell us all about it,” he went on, eagerly, and he listened and asked questions till he found he was late for school, and jumped up and seized his books.
“Oh, dear, I’m late! Whatever’ll teacher say?”
“Oh, leave ole school!” said Doris, quickly, “and come and play with us.”
“I can’t. But I’ll come in after school, if Mamma will let me.”
“Oh, yes, do! Good-bye—good-bye.”
Then a friendship sprang up, and little Willie spent most of his time with his new friends. He could listen for hours and hours about the horses and sheep and rabbits, and he asked such funny questions that the children would scream with laughter.
“Oh, Willie! you ought to come up with us, and see it all,” they said one day. “It’ll be all pretty and green now, and you could learn to ride.”
“Learn to ride!”