“I only put it in the locket because I hadn’t anything else the right size. That’s all.”
“Then why did you make such a fuss when I—”
“Because I thought it very rude of you to look into somebody else’s locket without permission. And it might have been something that mattered.”
There was that in the unconverted look on the little face which made Hildegarde hot to her ear-tips.
But Bella said not a word, only smiled with that returning interest in life that so readily revives in the breast of the shrewd observer. And without a “please” or a “will you?” Bella handed the big girl her slate, with its two days’ accumulation of fractions and of dragons. Hildegarde’s sensibilities were once more so outraged that for a moment she hesitated to accept the task so coolly put upon her.
“I believe you’re a little monster,” said Miss Mar, in her slow way. “I don’t see why I should trouble myself about you or your arithmetic.”
“I know why,” returned Bella, unmoved.
“Why?”
“Because you’re the nicest of all the big girls.”
Hildegarde tried to conceal the fact that she was somewhat softened by this tribute. “I’m not really the nicest,” she said, trying to be modest.