"Of course you're ever so much the prettiest. And I wish _we_ could go to the Museum together, just us two." Jim thought it would be fine to take out _one_ girl. That mollified Lily a little. "And I just wish you lived up by our house. It seems so easy then to come in. And when you once get real well acquainted--intimate like--well, you know I like you better than any girl in school;" though Jim wondered a little if it was absolutely true. "Do you, really?" The eyes and the smile always conquered him. She made good use of both. "Oh, you know I do." Chris didn't see why she couldn't get acquainted with Margaret. She wanted her mother to call, but Mrs. Ludlow said, "I've more friends now than I can attend to." And Miss Margaret seemed to hold up her head so high. Then Mr. Stephen was going to marry in the Beekman family. And Chris wondered why Mr. John didn't go in some store business instead of learning a carpenter's trade. Hester Brown was out of school a week. Mrs. Craven had begged the girls not to tease her, but after a few days she announced that a mistake had been made in the calculation--some people thought three years--but the end was sure. However three years seems a lifetime to children. CHAPTER X A MERRY CHRISTMAS George Underhill came down and made a nice long visit. He felt he liked his own home people a little the best, but his heart was still set on farming. Thanksgiving came after a lovely Indian summer, such as one rarely sees now. Then each State appointed its own Thanksgiving, and there were people who boasted of partaking of three separate dinners. After that it was cold. The little girl had a good warm cloak and hood and mittens, and it was nothing to run to school. She studied and played, and knew two pretty exercises on the piano. Jim and Benny Frank grew like weeds. But Benny somehow "gave in" to the boys, and two or three of the school bullies did torment him. "I'd just give it to them!" declared Jim. "I wouldn't be put upon and called baby and a mollycoddle and have that Perkins crowding me off the line and losing marks. I'd give him such a right-hander his head would hum like a swarm of bees." It was not because Benny was afraid. But he was a peace-loving boy and he thought fighting brutal and vulgar. His books were such a delight. He liked to go in and talk to Mr. Theodore, as they all called the eldest Whitney son. Mr. Theodore in his newspaper capacity had found out so many queer things about old New York, they really called New York that in early 1800. He had such wonderful portfolios of pictures, and nothing in the Whitney house was too good to use.