"Whew—what a little spitfire she has become!" exclaims Bob, somewhat discomfited, when Addie has left the room. "She must be hard to get on with, Polly, if she often pulls like that."
"Oh, I don't mind her in the least!" answers Polly lightly. "As you say, Bob, she has no backbone; so I let her calm down, stick quietly to my point all the time, and get what I want in the end. The brother-in-law is harder to manage; but I think I have discovered the way to work him too."
"Have you?" he asks eagerly. "D'ye know, it strikes me you're a pretty sharp customer to deal with, sister mine; there's more in you than appears on the surface."
"I don't want to boast; but I think I shall get on," she answers, with becoming modesty.
"But the discovery, Polly, the discovery? You'll share it with your beloved brother, won't you?"
"I will, if you promise not to overwork it."
"I promise!"
"Well, then, when you want to coax anything out of him, want to go anywhere, or get him to do anything for you, just hint to him judiciously that you think Addie would like it, or is anxious on the subject, and you'll find somehow that the thing will work as you want."
"Oh!" says Robert, with a sigh of enlightenment; and then he falls into a "brown-study," in which he seeks the most diplomatic way of introducing his sister's name into a certain personal project that lies very near his heart, and which he is half afraid to broach to his indulgent brother-in-law.
"I managed the ball on that principle," says Pauline, with a low laugh. "I hinted to him that it had been the dream of Addie's life that we two should go to our first ball together, and he took the bait at once. It was only a partial falsehood, Bob, you know, because long ago she and I used occasionally to build castles in the air; we always entered fairyland in a double pair of glass slippers, Addie and I—we always met our prince at the same magic ball. Hers, I remember, poor dear, was a tall slim youth, fair-haired, blue-eyed, and scarlet-coated; mine was dark and fierce, mysteriously wicked."