"They were about as unlike Kitty's old home as anything could well be, She has made her rooms pretty enough, but it was easy to see she is hard up for flowers. She's got an old rose-colored Sevres bowl that was my Grandmother's, and there it was, filled with bramble leaves and Traveller's Joy, (which she calls Old Man's Beard; Kitty always would differ from her elders!) and a soup-plate full of forget-me-nots. She said two of the children had half-drowned themselves, and lost a good straw hat in getting them for her. Just like their mother, as I told her."
"What did she say when you brought out the basket?" asked Chris, disposing of his reserve of currants at one mouthful, and laying down his spoon.
"She said, 'Oh! oh! oh!' till I told her to say something more amusing, and then she said, 'I could cry for joy!' and, 'Tell Hobbs he remembers all my favorites.'"
Christopher here bent his head over his empty plate, and said grace (Chris is very particular about his grace), and then got down from his chair and went up to Lady Catherine, and threw his arms round her as far as they would go, saying, "You are good. And I love you. I should think she thinked you was a fairy godmother."
After they had hugged each other, Aunt Catherine said, "Will you take me into the game, if I serve them that have no garden?"
Chris and I said "Yes" with one voice.
"Then come into the drawing-room," said Aunt Catherine, getting up and giving a hand to each of us. "And Chris shall give me a name."
Chris pondered a long time on this subject, and seemed a good deal disturbed in his mind. Presently he said, "I won't be selfish. You shall have it."
"Shall have what, you oddity?"
"I'm not an oddity, and I'm going to give you the name I invented for myself. But you'll have to wear four stockings, two up and two down."