Violet smiled, and a dash of exquisite color shot into her cheeks at the form of the question.
"No, dear; I am simply here to ascertain if I will be a suitable governess and companion for you," she answered, thinking it best to come to the point at once.
"Oh!" and Miss Bertha's tone changed instantly. Evidently the subject of a governess was not an acceptable one to her. "I hate governesses; they are stiff and proper. Do you get cross and ill-natured when little girls don't mind you, Miss Huntington?"
Violet laughed out in her musical, merry way at this personal question.
"Because if you do," the child went on, gravely, "I don't want you. All my governesses have been cross and wouldn't let me do as I want to. What a nice smile you have!" she rambled on, her fingers lingering caressingly about Violet's mouth, "and you laugh out so prettily I like to hear it. You are pretty and—and nice, aren't you?"
"Perhaps it would be just as well, dear, not to discuss those points at present," Violet returned, with some embarrassment, for Mr. Lawrence's smiling eyes told her that he fully concurred in his daughter's admiring remarks; "but I hope I could never be cross or ill-natured toward any little girl," and the sudden tenderness that leaped into her tone seemed to add, as plainly as words could have done, "who could not see."
"I reckon you are nice," said Bertha, reflectively. "Do you like dolls?" she asked, as she laid her hand upon the group in her lap.
"Yes, indeed," and Violet laughed and flushed consciously. "Do you know," she added, confidentially, "after I became so old that I was ashamed to be seen playing with them, I used to beg to be allowed to dress them for fairs and for the children of my friends? Of course under those circumstances I could not be accused of playing with them, and yet, between you and me, I had a very nice time with them."
Violet thereupon began making some inquiries regarding the doll family before her, and quite an entertaining conversation was kept up for several minutes, greatly to the amusement of Mr. Lawrence and the maid, who had never before seen a would-be-governess put herself so en rapport with her prospective pupil. They had always seemed to think they must be "stiff" and "proper," as Bertha had said.
"Do you play the organ and piano, and can you sing?" Bertha inquired, eagerly, after the subject of dolls had been exhausted.