“I’ll fetch it,” she said briskly. “I saw it on Master Boy’s bed a minute ago.”
She left the room, to return again directly with the interesting animal in question—quite a respectably-sized toy cow with a movable head which wagged up and down for a long time when set in motion by the touch of a finger. It had a blue ribbon round its neck, and Boy called it ‘Dunny.’ He welcomed it now as he saw it with the confiding smile of long and experienced friendship.
“Ullo Dunny!” he said—“Wants out wiz Boy? Tum along zen!” And receiving the pasteboard quadruped in his arms he embraced it with effusion.
“It is most absurd!” said Mrs. D’Arcy-Muir grandiosely—“Still it would be rather awkward for you, Letitia, if he were to start crying for his Cow!”
“It would indeed!” and the laughter still lighted up Miss Letitia’s soft eyes with a keen and merry twinkle—“I would not be without the Cow for worlds!”
Something in her voice or smile caused Mrs. D’Arcy-Muir to feel slightly cross. There was an unmistakable air of youth about this “old maid”—a sense of fun and a spirit of enjoyment which were not in ‘Muzzy’s’ composition. And ‘Muzzy’ straightway got an idea into her head that she was “out of it,” as it were,—that Miss Letitia, Boy and ‘Dunny’ all understood each other in a manner which she could never grasp, and knew the way to a fairy-land where she could never follow. And it was with a touch of snappishness that she said,—
“Well!—if you are going, hadn’t you better go? My husband will probably be coming in here soon,—and he might perhaps make some objection to Boy’s leaving——”
“Oh, I won’t run the risk of that!” answered Miss Leslie quickly. “Come along, Boy!—say good-bye to Mother!”
Holding his ‘Cow’ with one hand to his breast, Boy raised his pretty little face to be kissed again.
“Goo’ bye, Muzzy dee-ar!” he murmured—“’Ope Dads better soon! Kiss Dads for Boy!”