er last.

At other times she laughed as she had never laughed before in all the
five years or more that Johnnie had lived in the Barber flat; and broke
out in jolly choruses. If Big Tom came in, she did not stop singing
until he bade her to, and the moment he was gone, she was at it again,
with a few dance steps thrown in, the blue eyes sparkling mischievously,
and dimples showing in cheeks that were pink.

She also had dreamy spells; and if left undisturbed would sit at the
window by the hour, her eyes on the sky, her slender hands clasped, a
smile, sweet and gentle, fixing her young mouth. And Johnnie knew by
that smile that she was thinking thinks--that the kitchen was occupied
by people whom he did not see. He guessed that one of these was of Royal
blood; and came to harbor hostile thoughts toward a certain young
Prince, since never before had Cis failed to share her visions with
Johnnie. For the first time he found himself shut out.

Once he caught her talking out loud. "I wish," she murmured, "I wish, I
wish--"

"Who're you talkin' to?" he asked.

She started, and blushed. "Why--why, I'm talking to you," she declared.

"Well, then, what is it y' wish?" he persisted. "Go ahead. I'm
listenin'."

But it had slipped her mind, she said crossly. Yet the next moment, in
an excess of regret and affection, "Oh, Johnnie, you're so dear! So
dear!" she told him, and gave him a good hug.

He worried about her not a little those days; and though from a natural
delicacy he did not discuss her with Mr. Perkins, he did ask the leader
an anxious question: "Could a girl be hurt by pinnin' a hot wad of braid
right against the back of her brain?"

Mr. Perkins looked surprised. "They all do it," he pointed out.
(Evidently he did not surmise whom Johnnie had in mind.)

"But s'pose a girl ain't used to it," pressed Johnnie.

"They get used to it," assured Mr. Perkins.

But Cis got worse and worse. One day soon after this, Johnnie came upon
Edwarda, face down on the blue-room floor, and in a harrowing state of
dishevelment--Edwarda, the costly, the precious, the not-to-be-touched!
And when, on Cis's return, he tested her affection for the new doll by
swinging it unceremoniously by one leg in Letitia fashion, "Don't break
her," Cis cautioned indifferently; "because I'm going to give her away
one of these days to some poor little girl."

He gasped. She was going to give away _His namesake_!

Then his eyes were opened, and h