The latter had extracted Grace's half-filled candy box from under a cushion where she had hastily hidden it at the first threat of invasion by the insatiable twins and was at the moment busily engaged in devouring its contents. Grace had been too busy watching Dodo to notice him.
"Ooh, you bad boy! You bad boy!" wailed the little girl, making a dash for Paul, who deftly evaded her and took refuge behind Betty's chair, "Div me dos tandies—dive 'em to me."
"Can't," mumbled Paul, his mouth full, adding by way of explanation a convincing: "All gone."
"Paul Billette, come here this minute," commanded Mollie sternly, while Betty and Amy tried hard to check their rising mirth and Grace looked bereft. "Come here I say."
"Make Dodo go 'way then," bargained Paul, adding in an explanatory tone: "Last time she pulled my hair."
"An' me's goin' do it 'dain," declared Dodo vengefully, when Betty reached over suddenly and pulled the little girl into her lap.
"Stay here a minute, Honey," she coaxed, and as Dodo tried vainly to wriggle loose added: "Sister wants to speak to Paul."
"An' I," said Dodo soberly, "want to pull his hair."
Again the girls had to strangle their mirth while Mollie reiterated her command to Paul. The latter, after regarding the wriggling Dodo for a minute uncertainly, reluctantly left his refuge and stood before Mollie, head hanging.
"I'se sorry," he said in a small voice, trying to forestall the scolding he knew was coming. "Me never do it any more!"