My father laughed again.
“Whatever he did, he has cured my headache,” was his next remark; “I feel as right as a trivet. I’ll come downstairs, and I’ll turn those lads out, and those girls.”
“But, father—father darling—they have come by invitation. It isn’t their fault.”
My father took my hand.
“So you are lonely, Dumps?” he said. “And why in the world should you be lonely?”
“I want friends,” I said. “I want some one to love me.”
“All women make that sort of cry,” was his next remark. He pulled me close to him and raised my head and looked into my face.
“You have a nice little face of your own,” he said, “and some day you will find— But, pshaw! why talk nonsense to the child? How old are you, Dumps?”
“I’ll be sixteen in six months,” I said. “It is a long way off to have a birthday, but it will come in six months.”
“And then you’ll be seventeen, and then eighteen, and, hey presto! you’ll be a woman. My goodness, child! put off the evil day as long as you can. Keep a child as long as possible.”