"Be you overhet. Uncle Dan'l?" she would ask.

"No, little Dan'l, uncle ain't a mite overhet," the old man would assure
her. Now and then little Dan'l left her doll, climbed into the old man's
lap, and waved the palm-leaf fan before his face.

Old Daniel Wise loved her so that he seemed, to himself, fairly alight
with happiness. He made up his mind that he would find some little girl
in the village to come now and then and play with little Dan'l. In the
cool of that evening he stole out of the back door, covertly, lest
Sarah Dean discover him, and walked slowly to the rector's house in the
village. The rector's wife was sitting on her cool, vine-shaded veranda.
She was alone, and Daniel was glad. He asked her if the little girl
who had come to live with her, Content Adams, could not come the next
afternoon and see little Dan'l. "Little Dan'l had ought to see other
children once in a while, and Sarah Dean makes real nice cookies," he
stated, pleadingly.

Sally Patterson laughed good-naturedly. "Of course she can, Mr. Wise,"
she said.

The next afternoon Sally herself drove the rector's horse, and brought
Content to pay a call on little Dan'l. Sally and Sarah Dean visited in
the sitting-room, and left the little girls alone in the parlor with
a plate of cookies, to get acquainted. They sat in solemn silence and
stared at each other. Neither spoke. Neither ate a cooky. When Sally
took her leave, she asked little Dan'l if she had had a nice time with
Content, and little Dan'l said, "Yes, ma'am."

Sarah insisted upon Content's carrying the cookies home in the dish with
a napkin over it.

"When can I go again to see that other little girl?" asked Content as
she and Sally were jogging home.

"Oh, almost any time. I will drive you over-because it is rather a
lonesome walk for you. Did you like the little girl? She is younger than
you."

"Yes'm."

Also little Dan'l inquired of old Daniel when the other little girl was
coming again, and nodded emphatically when asked if she had had a nice
time. Evidently both had enjoyed, after the inscrutable fashion of
childhood, their silent session with each other. Content came generally
once a week, and old Daniel was invited to take little Dan'l to the
rector's. On that occasion Lucy Rose was present, and Lily Jennings. The
four little girls had tea together at a little table set on the porch,
and only Lily Jennings talked. The rector drove old Daniel and the child
home, and a