took her usual Sunday morning
stroll around the place with him, "that new girl isn't nice at all. When
I smiled at her, she scowled and shook her head at me."

"Oh, Dolly, I imagine she's all right. Mr. Forrest told me about them.
He knows them and he says they're charming people."

"Well, they may be, but I don't want to meet her. Don't walk over that
way."

"Yes, I shall. Mr. Rose seems to be coming this way, and I shall do the
neighbourly thing and have a chat with him."

"Why, Father, you don't know him."

"That doesn't matter between next-door neighbours, at least between the
men of the houses. Come along, and scrape acquaintance with the little
girl. I think she looks pretty."

Dolly started, then a sudden fit of shyness seized her, and she stood
stock-still.

"I can't," she murmured; "oh, Father, please don't ask me to!"

"All right, dear; don't if you don't want to. Run back to the house. I'm
going to speak to Mr. Rose."

And that's how it happened that as the two men neared each other, with
greeting smiles, the two girls, started simultaneously, and ran like
frightened rabbits away from each other, and to their respective homes.

CHAPTER II

DOTTY ROSE AND DOLLY FAYRE

A few days passed without communication between the two houses.

Mr. Fayre expressed a decided approval of his new neighbour, and advised
his wife to call on Mrs. Rose. Mrs. Fayre said she would do so as soon
as the proper time came.

"I'm not going," said Dolly. "I don't like that girl, and I never
shall."

"Why, Dorinda," said her father, who only used her full name when he was
serious, "I've never known you to act so before. I've thought you were a
nice, sweet-tempered little girl, and here you are acting like a
cantankerous catamaran!"

"What is the matter with you, Doll?" asked Trudy; "you are unreasonable
about the little Rose girl."

"Let her alone," said Dolly's mother; "she'll get over it."

"I'll never get over it," declared Dolly; "I don't want to know a girl
as big as I am, who plays with dolls."

"How do you know she plays with dolls?"

"Well, a dolls' carriage went in there the day they moved in."

"Perhaps it's one she used to have, and she has kept it, for old
associations."

"Maybe. Anyhow, I don't like her. She made faces at me."

"Really?" and her mother smiled.

"Well, she scowled at me, and shook her head like a--like a--"

"Like a little girl shaking her head," said Mr. Fayre, to help