"I don't want her to know," replied Floss, opening her eyes and establishing herself more securely in her present quarters; "that's why I wunned away." She evidently was prepared to resist all recognition of established authority by her new friend; but nurse, less easily deluded than the tiny rebel had imagined, at this juncture fortunately made her appearance, proving by no means loth to accept a half-hour's holiday. "I will bring Miss Floss in myself," said Eugenia. "You can show me the way to the nursery, can't you, Floss?" And nurse retreated, murmuring hopes that Mrs Chancellor would not find her charge too troublesome, and inwardly not a little astonished at the whimsical infant's unwonted sociability. Floss's next proceeding was to peer up deliberately into her aunt's eyes, pushing Eugenia's hat back a little off her face, the better to pursue her investigations. "What are you looking at, Floss?" asked her aunt. "I don't like my hat at the back of my head; the sun makes my eyes ache." "Your eyes is wed," observed Floss with satisfaction, quite ignoring Eugenia's mild remonstrance. "You've been cwying. Why do you cwy? Aunt Woma never does." "Doesn't she?" said Eugenia. "Perhaps she does, only you don't see. Most people cry sometimes, when they are sorry." "And are you sowwy? I am sowwy if you are," said the child, with a change to tenderness in her tone which Eugenia had not expected. "Have you been naughty and has somebody scolded you? _I_ am _vewy_ often scolded," and she shook her head with a curious mixture of resignation and indifference. "But you are a little girl, poor little Floss, and I am big," said Eugenia, feeling the tears not very far off, however, notwithstanding her self-assertion; "big people aren't scolded like children. Big people are sorry about other things." "Then I don't want to be big," said Floss, decidedly. "Now tell me about when you was little. How many dolls had you, and was your cat white or speckly like mine?" "I had a great many dolls," replied Eugenia, "but they weren't all mine; they were _between_ with my sister. But we had no cat." "What a pity!" said Floss, sympathisingly. "Wouldn't your mamma let you?" "I had no mamma," said Eugenia; "only a papa and a sister." "A papa," said Floss, consideringly. "I don't know if papas is nice. _Mammas_ isn't, not always. How big was your sister--as big as Quin?" "How big is Quin?" "_Vewy_ big," said Floss, importantly. "He's past nine. He's away at school now." "And don't you love him very much?" "Yes, he's a nice boy, only nurse says it's a chance if school doesn't spoil him. How could school spoil him? Mamma spoils him, nurse says." "I think nurse shouldn't say so many things," observed Eugenia, sagely. "But never mind about spoiling. Well, my little sister was very fond of me and I was very fond of her, and we learned our lessons together and had lots of dolls."