"Why, Father, you don"t know him."
"That doesn"t matter between next-door neighbours, at least between the men of the houses. Come along, and sc.r.a.pe acquaintance with the little girl. I think she looks pretty."
Dolly started, then a sudden fit of shyness seized her, and she stood stock-still.
"I can"t," she murmured; "oh, Father, please don"t ask me to!"
"All right, dear; don"t if you don"t want to. Run back to the house. I"m going to speak to Mr. Rose."
And that"s how it happened that as the two men neared each other, with greeting smiles, the two girls, started simultaneously, and ran like frightened rabbits away from each other, and to their respective homes.
CHAPTER II
DOTTY ROSE AND DOLLY FAYRE
A few days pa.s.sed without communication between the two houses.
Mr. Fayre expressed a decided approval of his new neighbour, and advised his wife to call on Mrs. Rose. Mrs. Fayre said she would do so as soon as the proper time came.
"I"m not going," said Dolly. "I don"t like that girl, and I never shall."
"Why, Dorinda," said her father, who only used her full name when he was serious, "I"ve never known you to act so before. I"ve thought you were a nice, sweet-tempered little girl, and here you are acting like a cantankerous catamaran!"
"What is the matter with you, Doll?" asked Trudy; "you are unreasonable about the little Rose girl."
"Let her alone," said Dolly"s mother; "she"ll get over it."
"I"ll never get over it," declared Dolly; "I don"t want to know a girl as big as I am, who plays with dolls."
"How do you know she plays with dolls?"
"Well, a dolls" carriage went in there the day they moved in."
"Perhaps it"s one she used to have, and she has kept it, for old a.s.sociations."
"Maybe. Anyhow, I don"t like her. She made faces at me."
"Really?" and her mother smiled.
"Well, she scowled at me, and shook her head like a--like a--"
"Like a little girl shaking her head," said Mr. Fayre, to help her out.
But Dolly didn"t smile. She was a queer nature, was Dolly. Usually sunny and happy-hearted, she liked almost everything and everybody, but if she did take a dislike, it became a prejudice, and very hard to remove.
Dolly was pretty, with the bluest of blue eyes and the pinkest of pink cheeks and the yellowest of yellow hair. She was inclined to be plump, and Trudy was always beseeching her not to eat so much candy and sweet desserts. But Dolly loved these things and had small concern about her increasing weight. She didn"t care much for outdoor play, and would rather sit in the hammock and read a story-book than run after tennis b.a.l.l.s.
Her mother called her a dreamer, and often came upon her, sitting in the twilight, her thoughts far away in a fairyland of her own imagination, enjoying wonderful adventures and thrilling scenes.
Dolly was in the grammar school and next year would be in the high school. She didn"t like study, particularly, except history and literature, but she studied conscientiously and always knew her lessons.
This morning, she kissed her mother good-bye, and started off for school. She wore a blue and white gingham, and a fawn-coloured coat.
Swinging her bag of books, she marched past the Rose house, and though she didn"t look at her, she could see the Rose girl on the front steps.
"I wonder if she"ll go to our school," thought Dolly; and for a moment the impulse seized her to stop and "sc.r.a.pe acquaintance." Then she remembered that shaking head, and fearing a rebuff, she walked on by.
"Do you know that new girl next door to you?" Celia Ferris asked her as she entered the school yard.
"No; do you?" and Dolly looked indifferent.
"No, I don"t; but my mother knows a lady, who knows them and she says Dorothy,--that"s her name,--is a wonder."
"A wonder! How?"
"Oh, she"s so smart and so clever, and she can do everything so well."
This was enough for Dolly Fayre. To think that disagreeable new neighbour of hers, must be a paragon of all the virtues!
But Dolly was never unjust. She knew she had no real reason to dislike Dorothy Rose, so she only said, "I haven"t met her yet. My mother is going to call there this week, and then I s"pose I"ll get acquainted with her."
"How funny," said Celia, who was chummy by nature. "I should think you"d go in and play with her without waiting for your mother to call,--and all that. Anybody"d think you were as old as Trudy."
"Oh, I could do that if I wanted to, but I don"t want to."
"Well, I think I"ll go to see her, anyway. If she"s so smart it would be nice to have her in the Closing Day exercises. I s"pose she"ll come to school here."
"Of course, you can do as you like, Celia, but I think it"s too late to get any new girls in now."
Dolly went on to the schoolroom, her heart full of resentment at this "smart" interloper. It was a little bit a feeling of jealousy, for Dolly Fayre was head and front of everything that went on at the Berwick Grammar School, and it jarred a little to think of having a wonder-girl come in with a lot of new ideas and plans and mix everything all up at the last minute.
But don"t get any mistaken idea that Dolly Fayre was a mean-minded or small-natured girl. On the contrary, she was generosity itself in all her dealings with her schoolmates. Every one liked her, and with good reason, for she never quarrelled, and was always happy and smiling.
But the Rose girl had acted queer from the first, and Dolly couldn"t admit the desirability of bringing her into their already arranged "Closing Exercises." These were so important as to be almost sacred rites, and as usual Dolly was at the head of all the committees, and her word was law.
She went home from school that afternoon, thinking about it, and her pretty face looked very sober as she went in the house and put her school-books neatly away in their place.
"There"s some lemonade and cookies on the sideboard," said her mother as Dolly went through the hall.
"All right, Mumsie," and somehow, after these refreshments had been absorbed, Dolly felt better, and life seemed to have a brighter outlook.
She took an unfinished story-book and picked up her white kitten, and went out to the side verandah, her favourite spot of a warm afternoon.
"You see, Flossy," she whispered, addressing the kitten, "I want you with me, "cause I"m buffled to-day." Dolly was in the habit of making up words, if she couldn"t think of any to suit her, and just at the moment _buffled_ seemed to her to mean a general state of being ruffled, and buffeted and rebuffed and generally huffy.