"There, there, Patty! You're too big a girl to cry." Uncle Bobby patted her curls, with kindly solicitude. "How would you like to go to the circus with me some day next week, and see all the animals?"
Patty cheered up.
"Will there be ele-phunts?" she asked.
"There'll be several," he promised. "And lions and tigers and camels."
"Oh, goody!" she clapped her hands and smiled through her tears. "I'd love to go. Sank you very, very much."
Half an hour later Patty rejoined her friends in Paradise Alley. She executed a few steps of the sailor's hornpipe with the doll as partner, then plumped herself onto the middle of the bed and laughingly regarded her two companions through over-hanging curls.
"Tell us what he said," Kid implored. "We nearly pulled our necks out by the roots stretching over the banisters, but we couldn't hear a word."
"Did he kiss you?" asked Harriet.
"N-no." There was a touch of regret in her tone. "But he patted me on the head. He has a very sweet way with children. You'd think he'd had a course in kindergarten training."
"What did you talk about?" insisted Kid, eagerly.