That settled it for Nan. "My name is Nan Dorrington," she said, swallowing a lump in her throat, "and I hope we shall be very good friends."
"We are sure to be," replied the other, with emphasis. "I always know at once."
They went into the dim parlour, and Nan and Margaret sat with their arms entwined around each other. "Gabriel told me yesterday that you were a young girl," Nan remarked.
"I am seventeen," replied the other.
"Only seventeen! Why, I am seventeen, and yet I seem to be a mere child by the side of you. You talk and act just as a grown woman does."
"That is because I have never associated with children of my own age. I have always been thrown with older persons. And then my mother has been ill a long, long time, and I have been compelled to do a great deal of thinking. I know of nothing more disagreeable than to have to think. Do you dislike poor folks?"
"No, I don't," replied Nan, snuggling up to Margaret. "Some of my very bestest friends are poor."
Margaret smiled at the childish adjective, and placed her cheek against Nan's for a moment. "I'm glad you don't dislike poverty," she said, "for we are very poor."
"When it comes to that," Nan responded, "everybody around here is poor—everybody except Grandfather Clopton and Mr. Tomlin. They have money, but I don't know where they get it. Nonny says that some folks have only to dream of money, and when they wake in the morning they find it under their pillows."
Dr. Dorrington came downstairs at this moment. "Your mother is very much better than she was awhile ago," he said to Margaret. "She never should have made so long a journey. She has wasted in that way strength enough to have kept her alive for six months."