She clasped her arms round my somewhat stout waist.
“Wrong—wrong!” I cried.
She opened her eyes and uttered a merry laugh.
“I have been introduced to you,” she said, “by special letter from my friend Lilian St. Leger. And you are Dumps?”
“Of course,” I said.
“Good! You do look jolly. I am Rosalind Mayhew. I am a great friend of Lilian’s. Of course, I am younger than she is—I am a year younger—and I am going to be at school for another year, so I’ll see you through, Dumps; Lilian has asked me to.”
“Sit down and tell us about every thing,” I said. “You know we are such strangers.”
“Washed up on this inhospitable shore, we scarcely know what we are to do with ourselves, or what savages we are to meet,” said Hermione very merrily.
“Then I’ll just tell you everything I can. You know, Mademoiselle Wrex would be wild if she knew that I had come up to see you this evening. She said I was not to do so, but to leave you in peace. Well, I could not help myself. I slipped out to come here, and I told Elfreda and Riki and Fhemie and Hortense that I could not resist it any longer.”
“What queer names!” I said.