Then Dotty wandered into the nursery, and stood all alone, leaning against the lounge.
"I shouldn't think my mother'd let me be so cross," mused she.
She did not cry, for she had learned very young that crying is of no use; and it may be, too, that she had only a small fountain of tears back of her eyes. Prudy, entering the nursery in eager haste, for her "bean-bags," was touched at sight of her sister's sad face.
"There, now, I'll put back my bean-bags, and try to make her happy," said Prudy to herself. "That will be following the Golden Rule; for it's doing unto Dotty as I want Susy to do unto me, when I'm sick."
She went quietly up to Dotty, who still stood leaning gloomily against the lounge. The child turned around with a sudden smile. It cheered her to see Prudy's sweet face, which was always sunny with a halo of happy thoughts.
"Are you real sick, though, Dotty Dimple?"
"Yes, I are," replied Dotty, well pleased to be asked such a question. "I got 'most drowned, you know. O, I wish you'd stayed out in the rain the other day, and got cold; then you'd have been sick, too."
Prudy smiled, for she knew that her little sister really had no such unkind wish at heart. She was only trying, with her limited stock of words, to say that she longed to have a little sympathy. It was not often that Dotty was willing to be pitied.
"See here, Prudy darling, don't you want a piece of my cough-candy? It's good! You may bite clear down to there, where I've scratched with a pin."
"No, thank you, dear, I don't care a bit for it."