ity to the winds,
she lifted Mary in a transport of love which wouldn't be denied any
longer, and pretended to bite the end of the poor babe's nose off.

"Oh, I know it's candy," she said, mumbling away and hugging the blessed
child. "It's even got powdered sugar on it--"

"That's talcum powder," said Miss Patty, watching with a jealous eye.

"Powdered sugar, yes," persisted Miss Cordelia, mumbling on. "I know. And
I know why her nose turns up at the end, too. That naughty Miss Patty
washed it with yellow soap one night when I wasn't looking--"

"I never, never did!" protested Miss Patty, all indignation in a moment.

"Washed it with yellow soap, yes," still persisted Miss Cordelia, "and
made it shine like a star. And that night, when Mary lay in her bed, the
moon looked through the window and saw that little star twinkling there,
and the moon said 'Little star! Little star! What are you doing there in
Mary's bed? You come up here in the sky and twinkle where you belong!'
And all night long, Mary's little nose tried to get up to the moon, and
that's why it turns up at the end--" And then in one grand finale of
cannibalistic transport, Miss Cordelia concluded, "Oh, I could eat her
up!"

But it was Miss Patty's turn then, because although Cordelia bathed the
child, it was the younger sister's part to dress her. So Miss Patty put
her arms out with an authority which wouldn't take "No" for an answer,
and if you had been in the next room, you would then have heard--

"Oh, where have you been
My pretty young thing--?"

Which is a rather active affair, especially where the singer shows how
she danced her a dance for the Dauphin of France. By that time you won't
be surprised when I tell you that Miss Patty's cheeks had a downright
glow on them--and I think her heart had something of the same glow, too,
because, seating herself at last to dress our crowing heroine, she beamed
over to her sister and said (though somewhat out of breath) "Isn't it
nice!"

This, of course, was all strictly private.

In public, Mary was brought up with maidenly deportment. You would never
dream, for instance, that she was ever tickled with a turkey feather
(which Miss Cordelia kept for the purpose) or that she had ever been
atomized all over with Lily of the Valley (which Miss Patty never did
again because Ma'm Maynard, the old French nurse, smelled it and told the
maids). But always deep down in the child was an indefinable quality
whic