“Why, of course, of course—_I_ knew you’d spoil the child.” She brushed away her tears, and said with dignity: “Spoil the child? spoil _that_ child, Marse Tom? There can’t _anybody_ spoil her. She’s the king bee of this post, and everybody pets her and is her slave, and yet, as you know, your own self, she ain’t the least little bit spoiled.” Then she eased her mind with this retort: “Marse Tom, she makes you do anything she wants to, and you can’t deny it; so if she could be spoilt, she’d been spoilt long ago, because you are the very _worst_! Look at that pile of cats in your chair, and you sitting on a candle-box, just as patient; it’s because they’re her cats.” [Picture: “‘Look at that pile of cats in your chair’”] If Dorcas were a soldier, I could punish her for such large frankness as that. I changed the subject, and made her resume her illustrations. She had scored against me fairly, and I wasn’t going to cheapen her victory by disputing it. She proceeded to offer this incident in evidence on her twin theory: “Two weeks ago when she got her finger mashed open, she turned pretty pale with the pain, but she never said a word. I took her in my lap, and the surgeon sponged off the blood and took a needle and thread and began to sew it up; it had to have a lot of stitches, and each one made her scrunch a little, but she never let go a sound. At last the surgeon was so full of admiration that he said, ‘Well, you _are_ a brave little thing!’ and she said, just as ca’m and simple as if she was talking about the weather, ‘There isn’t anybody braver but the Cid!’ You see? it was the boy-twin that the surgeon was a-dealing with. “Who is the Cid?” “I don’t know, sir—at least only what she says. She’s always talking about him, and says he was the bravest hero Spain ever had, or any other country. They have it up and down, the children do, she standing up for the Cid, and they working George Washington for all he is worth.” “Do they quarrel?” “No; it’s only disputing, and bragging, the way children do. They want her to be an American, but she can’t be anything but a Spaniard, she says. You see, her mother was always longing for home, po’ thing! and thinking about it, and so the child is just as much a Spaniard as if she’d always lived there. She thinks she remembers how Spain looked, but I reckon she don’t, because she was only a baby when they moved to France. She is very proud to be a Spaniard.” Does that please you, Mercedes? Very well, be content; your niece is loyal to her allegiance: her mother laid deep the foundations of her love for Spain, and she will go back to you as good a Spaniard as you are yourself. She has made me promise to take her to you for a long visit when the War Office retires me.