dresses, and your pony, and your beautiful
car! And he hires all of us"--she swept a gesture--"to wait on you, you
naughty girl, and try to make a little lady out of you--"

"I hate ladies!" cried Gwendolyn, rapping her heels by way of emphasis.

"Tale-bearing is _vulgar_," asserted Miss Royle.

"Next year I'm going to _day_-school like Johnnie _Blake!_"

"Oh, hush your nonsense!" commanded Thomas, irritably.

Miss Royle glanced up at him. "That will do," she snapped.

He bridled up. "What the little imp needs is a good paddlin'," he
declared.

"Well, _you_ have nothing to do with the disciplining of the child. That
is _my_ business."

"It's what she needs, all the same. The very idear of her bawlin' all
the mornin' at the top of her lungs--"

"I did _not_ at the top of my lungs," contradicted Gwendolyn. "I cried
with my mouth."

"--So's the whole house can hear," continued Thomas; "and beatin' about
the floor. It's clear shameful, _I_ say, and enough to give a sensitive
person the nerves. As I remarked to Jane only---"

"You remark too many things to Jane," interposed the governess, curtly.

Now he sobered. "I _hope_ you ain't displeased with me," he ventured.

"_Ain't_ displeased?" repeated Miss Royle, more than ever fretful. "Oh,
Thomas, _do_ stop murdering the King's English!"

At that Gwendolyn sat up, shook back her hair, and raised a startled
face to the row of toys in the glass-fronted case. Murdering the King's
English! Had he _dared_ to harm her soldier with the scarlet coat?

"I was urgin' your betterin', too, Miss Royle," reminded Thomas, gently.
"I says to Jane, I says--"

The soldier was in his place, safe. Relieved, Gwendolyn straightened out
once more on her back.

"--'The whole lot of us ought to be paid higher wages than we're
gettin' for it's a real trial to have to be under the same roof with
such a provokin'--'"

Miss Royle interrupted by vigorously bobbing her head. "Oh, that I have
to make my living in this way!" she exclaimed, voice deep with
mournfulness. "I'd rather wash dishes! I'd rather scrub floors! I'd
rather _star-r-ve!_"

Something in the vehemence, or in the cadence, of Miss Royle's
declaration again gave Gwendolyn that sense of triumph. With a sudden
curling up of her small nose, she giggled.

Miss Royle whirled with a rustle of silk skirts. "Gwendolyn," she said
threateningly, "if you're going to act like that, I shall know there's
something the matter with yo