they were all getting on," and he liked her).
There she sat on a small rocking-chair with a bundle on her knee.

"Come, my darling, and see your little sister," she cried cheerfully.

Ger advanced. She opened the head flannel and displayed a small, dark
head, and a red, puckered countenance.

"When will she be able to see?" asked Ger.

As if in answer the baby opened a pair of large dark eyes and stared
fixedly at the round, earnest face bent above her.

"See, bless you!" mother's nurse exclaimed, "see! why, she isn't a
kitten. She can see right enough. Look how she's taking you in. She
has stared about from the minute she was born, as if she'd been here
before and was looking round to see that things were all the same.
She's the living image of Squire."

"I think she's rather like a kitten," Ger persisted, "but I'm glad she
can see. I think she likes me rather."

And that was how the Kitten got her name.

She was not a Grantly. She was all Ffolliot, and she was the only one
of the children absolutely fearless in the presence of her father.

Small and dark and delicately made, with quick-sighted falcon-coloured
eyes that nothing escaped. Unlike her big, healthy brethren, she was
never in the slightest degree shy or clumsy, and she cared not a single
groat for anyone or anything in the whole wide world so long as she got
her own way. And this, being a member of the Ffolliot family, she did
not get nearly as often as she would have liked. But she understood
her father as did none of the others, and she could "get round him" in
a fashion that filled those others with astonished admiration.

She also considerably astonished Mr Ffolliot, for from the very first
she was familiar, and familiarity on the part of his children he
neither encouraged nor desired. Moreover, she was ubiquitous and
elusive. No army of nurses could restrain the Kitten in her
peregrinations. She could speak distinctly, run, and run fast, when
she was little over a year old, and she possessed a singularly
enquiring mind. She was demonstrative but not affectionate; she was
enchanting, and stony-hearted was the creature who could resist her.
She liked an audience, and she loved to "tell" things. To this end she
would sit on your knee and lay one small but determined hand upon your
cheek to turn your face towards her, so that she could make sure you
were attending. She kept the small hand there, soft and light, a
fairy-like caress