"You will, hey? I'll have something to say about that. Do you suppose I'll stay here and starve?" He tried to look very angry, but she knew all about his face, and his tone, and said nonchalantly, "Oh, you can go over to the other house and get something to eat." "Well, we'll see, little Miss Madam. You'll be gravely mistook!" So they jested and pretended to bicker. Then grandad set up Norah with a pony and a sort of jaunting car, that would only hold two. For Daffodil could no longer keep her seat in the old fashion, neither would her arms reach around grandad. Sometimes Norah took out Barbe and the little boy. For Daffodil went to school quite regularly about eight months of the year. The remaining time most of the children were needed to help at home. Any other child would have been spoiled with the favoritism at school. The older ones helped her at her lessons, and in those days there were no easy kindergarten methods. They gave her tidbits of their luncheons, they piled her little basket with fruit, although she insisted there was so much at home. They brought her some strange flower they had found, they hovered about her as if there was some impelling sweetness, some charm. She had a way of dispensing her regard impartially, but with so tender a grace that no one was hurt. "I just wish we could go to the same school," Ned Langdale said in one of the Sunday rambles. He was always on the lookout for Norah and her. "But--the big boys go there." "Yes. Oh, you wouldn't like it a bit. Beside, you couldn't. And the lessons are just awful. And the thrashings----" "Don't. I can't hear about that;" shaking her pretty golden head. "No. Girls oughtn't. But they say it's good for children----" "For boys. Why, are boys worse than girls?" "Oh, they are not. I know some girls who are mean, and tricky, and don't tell the truth. All girls are not like you." "Maybe it's because everybody is so good to me. I couldn't be bad in return, you know." "Oh, I just wish you were my sister, and lived with us." "Well, you see that couldn't have been. God sent me to mother." "But a fellow can wish it." "It's queer, but there are a great many things wishing doesn't bring. I suppose it's because they _can't_ happen." He gave a sigh. She knew how to dance now; Norah had taught her, but it comes natural to most children, and it did to her. She used to dance by herself, and sometimes whirl little brother round, to the great amusement of her father. Ned used to stray over summer evenings to hear Mr. Carrick talk about the war, and the dangers he had escaped. He never told the hardest side of it, not even to Barbe. There were other boys who made various errands, and if she was not home, went over to Sandy's for her.