“Oh, that is it,” said Miss Julia, very tenderly.
“Yes, that is it; and now you see I don't mind how bright the coat is—the little bow tells how I miss him. Will you just take a stitch in it, please, so that it will stay on all summer?”
So Miss Julia reopened her little sewing-bag, and the stitches were taken, and a few moments later Courage was on her way home, proud enough of the beautiful coat and hat, and eager to show them to Mary Duff, and yet sad at heart, too, for she had said good-bye to “Miss Julia.”
CHAPTER V.—SYLVIA.
There had been a week of active preparation, and now everything was ready, and Mary Duff and Courage, seated on a new little rope-bound trunk, were waiting for Larry to come. The house looked sadly forlorn and empty, for Mary had sold most of the furniture, that the money it brought might be put in the bank for Courage, and the only thing yet to be done was to hand over the keys to the new tenant expecting to take possession on the morrow. Mary had intentionally arranged matters in just this fashion. It was not going to be an easy thing to say good-bye to the little girl she had so lovingly cared for since her babyhood, and she knew well enough that to come back alone to the old home would half break her heart; therefore she had wisely planned that it should be “good-bye” to Courage and “how do you do” to little lame Joe in as nearly the same breath as possible.
At last there came a knock at the door, and Courage bounded to open it. Bruce, unmannerly fellow, crowded in first, and after Bruce, Larry, and after Larry—what? who? A most remarkable-looking object, with tight curling hair braided fine as a rope into six funny little pig-tails, with skin but a shade lighter than her coal-black eyes, and with a stiffly starched pink calico skirt standing out at much the same angle as the pig-tails. Mary Duff apparently was not in the least surprised at this apparition, but Courage stared in wide-eyed wonder. “Oh, isn't she funny?” were the words that sprang to her lips, but too considerate to give them utterance, she simply asked, “Who is she, Larry?”
“This is Sylvia,” said Larry; “Sylvia, this is Miss Courage,” whereupon Sylvia gave a little backward kick with one foot, which she meant to have rank as a bow.
“And who is Sylvia?” in a friendly voice that went straight to Sylvia's heart.