"I know that I shall like your cousin."
"Why?" the other three exclaimed in a chorus.
"I can't tell you why, only that I know I shall."
"You're welcome to," said Brenda, tossing her head, "but I guess if you had just begun to have your own house to yourself you wouldn't like somebody else coming that you'd have to treat exactly like a sister."
"Why, Brenda!" said Nora, with a look of surprise, and then the others remembered that Nora had had a little sister near her own age whose death was a great sorrow to her.
"Why, Brenda!" repeated Nora, "I wish that I had a sister."
Now Brenda Barlow was not nearly as heartless as her words implied. She had two sisters whom she loved very dearly. But they were both much older than Brenda, and by petting and spoiling her they had to a large extent helped to make her selfish. One of them had now been married for four years, and had gone to California to live and the other was in Paris completing her art studies. When Janet married, Brenda had not realized the change in the family. But when Agnes went to Paris, Brenda was older, and she fully felt her own importance as "Miss Barlow."
"It's the same as being 'Miss Barlow,'" she said to her friends, "the servants call me so, and I've moved my things down into Janet's room. I can invite any one I want to luncheon without asking whether Agnes has any plans,—and I shouldn't wonder if I could have a dinner-party once in a while—of course, not a very late one, but with raw oysters to begin with—sure—" and the other girls laughed, for they knew that Brenda had been practising on raw oysters for a long time, and that she felt proud of her present prowess in swallowing them without winking or making a face.
Mr. Barlow was generally absorbed in business affairs, and Mrs. Barlow had so many social engagements that Brenda did as she wished in most respects. She ordered the servants about when her mother was out, and they were as ready to obey her as her friends were to follow her lead, for when Brenda wanted her own way she never seemed ill-natured. She simply insisted with a very winning smile—and nobody could refuse her.
She had found it very pleasant to rule her little world. It was even pleasanter than being the spoiled and petted child that she had been when her sisters were at home. Her father and mother had never seen how fond she was growing of her own way until they announced the coming of her cousin Julia.