Then Dixie, sitting on the edge of the bed and holding fast to the little sister she loved, told her, as she had told Ken, about Grandmother Piggins’s game of pretend. “It’ll be awfully hard to pretend even to myself that I like Sylvia Clayburn,” Carol said; “but I’ll play that game, Dix, I will, honest, if you want me to.”
“Goodie, let’s start right this very minute,” the older girl exclaimed. “Now, remember, we’re to pretend that the horrid, rude things she will say are pleasant things.”
The younger girl sighed as she replied, “Well, I like hard games, but this one will be the hardest that I ever played.” Then, rising, she held out her hand as she continued, “Come on, Dixie, I’m going down to breakfast.”
What a glad light there was in the plain, freckled face of the older girl, and, springing to her feet, she kissed her truly beautiful younger sister as she whispered: “Thank you, dearie, you have made me very happy. Now it won’t be half so hard.” Then they left the loft and went down the ladder together.
Carol, eager to please Dixie, upon reaching the kitchen at once looked about for the small visitor whom she was to treat just as though she really liked her. She soon spied the little figure curled up in the big rocker, and a feeling of real sympathy swept over the heart of Carol.
Sylvia was indeed to be pitied, for she did not have a big, brave brother like Ken, nor a wonderful sister like Dixie, nor an adorable Jimmy-Boy, and, although she did live in a much finer house, it was not a real home. But, more than all else, the pale, sickly, spoiled child was to be pitied because she had such a vain, foolish mother.
Although Carol did not think these things out, she nevertheless did feel sorry for the little girl who was as unhappy because she had to visit them as they were to have her, and she decided to make the ordeal easier for Dixie by doing her part in the pretend-game.
The elder girl went at once to the stove to reheat the porridge for her own and Carol’s breakfast, but the younger little maid skipped across the room and said pleasantly: “Hello, Sylvia! You’ve come to visit us, haven’t you? Did you bring your dollie?”
“No, I didn’t!” was the sullen response. “You broke my best doll and I’m never going to forgive you. Never! Never!”
Now this was untrue, for it had been Sylvia’s own carelessness that had broken the doll, as she very well knew.