“Esmeralda is my child, even if she is only a doll,” and Vi marched away with Margy, her head held up proudly.
“Oh, my dear, I didn’t mean that you shouldn’t want to find your missing play child,” called Mrs. Bunker quickly, for she realized that a little girl’s feelings might be hurt by a slighting remark about even a dirty and spotted doll. “I only meant that I was glad none of you children was missing. I’ll help you look for Esmeralda.”
“She isn’t out on the porch. I looked,” said Margy.
“We left her there, didn’t we?” asked Vi, for sometimes there was so much going on at the Bunker house that to remember where one of the many dolls or other playthings was left became a task.
“Yes, we left Esmeralda out on the porch,” agreed Margy. “But she isn’t there now. I looked. She’s—she’s gone!”
Margy felt almost as sad over the loss as did Vi, though Esmeralda, or “Measles,” as Russ called her, belonged particularly to Violet.
“Do you s’pose a tramp would take my doll, Mother?” asked Violet, for Mrs. Bunker was now walking toward the side porch with her two little girls.
“No, my dear, I don’t believe so,” was the answer. “What would a tramp want with a doll?”
This puzzled Vi for a moment, but she quickly had ready a reply.
“He—he might want to give her to his little girl,” Vi said.