old lady. My dear, would you move the light a little nearer? I've dropped a stitch.
laura (starting up). Why, Mother dear, when did you come in?
julia (interposing with arresting hand). Don't! You mustn't try to touch her, or she goes.
laura. Goes?
julia. I can't explain. She is not quite herself. She doesn't always hear what one says.
laura (assertively). She can hear me. (To prove it, she raises her voice defiantly.) Can't you, Mother?
mrs. r. (the voice perhaps reminding her). Jane, dear, I wonder what's become of Laura, little Laura: she was always so naughty and difficult to manage, so different from Martha—and the rest.
laura. Lor', Julia! Is it as bad as that? Mother, 'little Laura' is here, sitting in front of you. Don't you know me?
mrs. r. Do you remember, Jane, one day when we'd all started for a walk, Laura had forgotten to bring her gloves, and I sent her back for them? And on the way she met little Dorothy Jones, and she took her gloves off her, and came back with them just as if they were her own.
laura. What a good memory you have, Mother! I remember it too. She was an odious little thing, that Dorothy—always so whiney-piney.