The two women looked at each other. They had sat uneasily down by the
sitting-room fire.
"I must say that I think you're rather hard on her, Lucretia," said
Maria, finally.
"I don't know as I've been any harder on her than you have," returned
Lucretia. "I shouldn't have said to take away that rag baby if I'd said
just what I thought."
"I think you'd better take it up to her, then, and stop that crying,"
said Maria.
Lucretia hastened into the north parlor without another word. She
carried the rag baby up-stairs to young Lucretia; then she came down to
the pantry and got a seed-cake for her. "I thought the child had better
have a little bite of something; she didn't eat scarcely a mite of
supper," she explained to Maria. She had given young Lucretia's head a
hard pat when she bestowed the seed-cake, and bade her eat it and go
right to sleep. The little girl hugged her rag baby and ate her cooky in
bliss.
The aunts sat a while longer by the sitting-room fire. Just before they
left it for the night Lucretia looked hesitatingly at Maria, and said,
"I s'pose you have noticed that wax doll down to White's store, 'ain't
you?"
"That big wax one with the pink dress?" asked Maria, faintly and
consciously.
"Yes. There was a doll's bedstead there, too. I don't know as you
noticed."
"Yes, I think I did, now you speak of it. I noticed it the day I went in
for the calico.
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