Sis was there, curled up in a chair, knitting for the soldiers. Having forgoten the Ball Game, as I have stated, I asked her, in case I had a caller, to go away, which, considering she has the house to herself all winter, I considered not to much.
“A caller!” she said. “Since when have you been allowed to have callers?”
I looked at her steadily.
“I am young,” I observed, “and still in the school room, Leila. I admit it, so don’t argue. But as I have not taken the veil, and as this is not a Penitentary, I darsay I can see my friends now and anon, especialy when they live next door.”
“Oh!” she said. “It’s the Gray infant, is it!”
This remark being purely spiteful, I ignored it and sat down to my book, which concerned the stealing of some famous Emerelds, the heroine being a girl detective who could shoot the cork out of a bottle at a great distance, and whose name was Barbara!
It was for that reason Jane had loaned me the book.
I had reached the place where the Duchess wore the Emerelds to a ball, above white satin and lillies, the girl detective being dressed as a man and driving her there, because the Duchess had been warned and hautily refused to wear the paste copies she had—when Sis said, peavishly:
“Why don’t you knit or do somthing useful, Bab?”
I do not mind being picked on by my parents or teachers, knowing it is for my own good. But I draw the line at Leila. So I replied: