“And are you sowwy? I am sowwy if you are,” said the child, with a change to tenderness in her tone which Eugenia had not expected. “Have you been naughty and has somebody scolded you? I am vewy often scolded,” and she shook her head with a curious mixture of resignation and indifference.
“But you are a little girl, poor little Floss, and I am big,” said Eugenia, feeling the tears not very far off, however, notwithstanding her self-assertion; “big people aren’t scolded like children. Big people are sorry about other things.”
“Then I don’t want to be big,” said Floss, decidedly. “Now tell me about when you was little. How many dolls had you, and was your cat white or speckly like mine?”
“I had a great many dolls,” replied Eugenia, “but they weren’t all mine; they were between with my sister. But we had no cat.”
“What a pity!” said Floss, sympathisingly. “Wouldn’t your mamma let you?”
“I had no mamma,” said Eugenia; “only a papa and a sister.”
“A papa,” said Floss, consideringly. “I don’t know if papas is nice. Mammas isn’t, not always. How big was your sister—as big as Quin?”
“How big is Quin?”
“Vewy big,” said Floss, importantly. “He’s past nine. He’s away at school now.”
“And don’t you love him very much?”