“You, Mary Ellen, must have the pleasure of giving it to Lydia,” said she, “because you are really the one who found the hiding-place.”
Lydia received the slipper from her friend with a shy smile.
“Thank you, Mary Ellen,” said she. “I’m sorry I thought you took it. And now that it’s scratched, you won’t mind my wearing them so much, will you?”
And arm in arm, the girls moved off, both entirely satisfied with this handsome apology.
“Look at them, whispering together out there,” said Miss Martin, half an hour later, to Mr. Blake, as she told him the story of the slippers. “They are the best of friends now.”
“Wouldn’t it be a good thing if Mary Ellen had a pair of those fancy slippers for herself?” asked Mr. Blake. “If you say so, I’ll take her down to the village now, and see what we can buy.”
“Oh, that would be nice,” answered Miss Martin, smiling at this good friend of her children. “She says she doesn’t like them, but that is only because she hasn’t any, I think. And we mustn’t let Mary Ellen be too strong-minded. She is only nine years old, you know.”
But Mary Ellen was not strong-minded in the least when she reached the village shoe shop. Indeed, she changed her mind three times before she finally decided upon a gay little pair of patent leather slippers with silver buckles.
“Now, what would you like, Roger?” asked kindly Mr. Blake of Lydia’s faithful shadow, who had accompanied them as a matter of course.
“I’d like to go home with Lydia,” answered Roger in all earnestness.