Two Little Women

"Mother says it's too late to begin this year. Here it is May, – and it closes in June. So she says for me to wait till next year."

This was comforting. If the girl didn't go to school this year she couldn't make any bother with the Closing Exercises. Beside, maybe she was not such a dislikable girl as she had seemed at first. Dolly sat and regarded her. At last she said: "Then the doll-carriage belongs to your little sister."

"To Genie, yes. How did you know she had one?"

"Saw it come with your things, the day you moved in."

"How old are you?"

"Fourteen, but I'll be fifteen next month, – June."

"Why, so will I! Isn't that funny! What day is your birthday?"

"The tenth."

"Mine's the twentieth. We're almost twins. And our names are quite alike, too. Mine's Dorothy, really, but they all call me Dotty."

"And mine's Dorinda, but I'm called Dolly."

"And we both have brothers at school, and we each have a sister."

"But mine is a big sister and yours is a little sister."

"Yes, but we have as many differences as we have likenesses. You're so fair, and – why, your name is Fayre!"

Dolly laughed. "Yes, and you're so rosy and your name is Rose!"

"Dotty Rose and Dolly Fayre! We ought to be friends. Shall we?"

Dolly hesitated. She was too honest to pretend to a liking she didn't quite feel. She looked squarely at Dotty Rose, and said, straightforwardly, "What made you scowl at me that first day you came?"

"I didn't!" and Dotty Rose opened her brown eyes in astonishment.

"Yes, you did; and you shook your head at me when I smiled to you. You were sitting in a window, with your legs hanging out."

"Sitting where! Oh, I remember! Why, I didn't scowl at you, it was because Aunt Clara called me to come in out of that window. And I didn't want to, so I scowled. I've a fearful temper. And then, she told me again to come in, and I shook my head. I wasn't shaking it at you! Why, I didn't know you then!"

Dolly drew a long breath. "Then that's all right! I thought you scowled because I smiled at you, and it made me mad. All right, I'll be friends with you. I'd like to. I think you're real nice."

"So do I you!"

CHAPTER III

THE NEW ROOMS

In the cushioned swing on the Fayres' verandah the two girls sat.

An artist would have stopped to admire the picture. Dorinda, her pink and white face framed in its golden halo of curlilocks, her light blue frock, neat and smooth, was calmly and daintily nibbling at a piece of cake, catching the crumbs carefully as they fell.

Beside her, Dorothy was rapidly munching her cake as she talked, and letting the crumbs fall where they might. Her black hair framed her rosy cheeks and her eyes snapped and sparkled as she gesticulated with both hands. It was Dorothy's habit to emphasise her remarks with expressive little motions, and her father often said that if her hands were tied behind her, she couldn't say a word!

Her pink lawn dress was rather tumbled by reason of her wriggling and jumping about, but Dorothy's frocks were rarely unrumpled after she had had them on ten minutes.

"We've been friends more than a week now," she said, as she finished her cake in one large bite and brushed a few stray bits out of her lap. "And I think you're just fine! I'm so glad we came to live in Berwick. I like you better than any girl I ever knew." Dotty spread her hands wide as if embracing all the girls who had figured in her previous existence. "Do you like me as much as that?"

As she spoke, she touched her toes to the floor and sent the swing up in the air with a mad jump.

"Oh!" gasped Dolly, as her cake flew out of her hand; "how – how sudden you are!"

"Never mind! Do you like me as much as I like you?"

"I don't know," and Dolly looked thoughtful; "I like you, of course, but I wish you'd sit stiller."

"Can't; I'm always jumpy. But you do like me, don't you, Dollyrinda?"

"Yes, but I can't hop into a liking the way you do. We're awfully different, you know."

"'Course we are! That's what makes us like each other. Just think, Dolly, we'll be fifteen soon. Don't you think we ought to be called by our full names and not Dolly and Dotty any more?"

"I don't know. Why?"

"Oh, 'cause we're too big for baby names. I'm going to stop wearing hair-ribbons."

"You are! How ever will you keep your hair back? And you've such a lot of it."

"I know. So've you. Why, I'll just braid it, and let the end flutter. But Mother says she won't let me till I'm sixteen. Well, we'll see. Do you want to grow up, Doll?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know anything! I never saw such a girl! Well, what are you going to do when you're fifteen?"

"I haven't thought about it. Do I have to do anything different from when I'm fourteen?"

"You don't have to! But don't you want to? What do you want to be when you're grown up?"

"Oh, then! Why, then I'm going to be an opera singer."

"Can you sing?"

"Not much yet. But Trudy says I have a nice voice and I'm going to learn."

"Pooh! I don't believe you'll ever sing in opera. I'm going to be an actress."

"Huh! Can you act?"

"Not yet; but I'm going to learn." Dotty smiled as she realised that their ambitions were at least equally promising. "Wouldn't it be fun if we did both get to be famous! Me an actress and you a singeress. But I may change my mind about mine. I do sometimes. Last winter I was crazy to be a trained nurse; but Mother wouldn't let me."

"Will she let you be an actress?"