"Let's play that Eugenie and Victoria are little girls come to make each other a visit, and Isabella is their Mamma."
"You can't! Little girls never have trains to their dresses or necklaces."
"Oh! I wish Nippy Scatch-Face and old Maria were down here," sighed Lulu.
"I'll tell you," put in May. "We'll play they are three stiff old ladies, who always wear best clothes, you know, and sit so in chairs; and that Nippy and Maria are coming to make them a visit. They needn't really come, you know. Mrs. Eugenie, sit up straight. Now listen to the hateful old thing! She's talking to Victoria."
"Sister, when are those children coming?"
"I don't know, sister," squeaked back Lulu in the character of Victoria. "I wish they wouldn't come at all. Children are the bane of my existence."
"You horrid doll, talking that way about my baby," cried Bertha, giving Victoria a shove.
"Don't, Beppie; you'll push her down," said May. Then changing her voice again, "Your manners is most awful, I'm sure," she squeaked, in the person of the irate Victoria.
All the children giggled, and Mrs. Frisbie looked up from her book.
At this moment in ran the two boys, hot, dusty, and excited,—Arthur with a handful of "fractional currency," and Jack waving a two-dollar bill.