judging from
appearances, unless, indeed--and then she told what old Peterkin had
said more than once, to the effect that Jerry Crawford, as she was
called, was growing to be the image of the Tracys, especially Arthur.

'And if so,' she added, 'you'd better let Arthur take care of her, and
save your money for your own children,'

To this Frank never replied. He knew better than old Peterkin that Jerry
was like the Tracys, or, rather, like his brother, and that it was not
so much in the features as in the expression and certain movements of
the head and hands, and tones of the voice when she was very much in
earnest, and raised it to a higher pitch than usual. She could speak
English very well now, and sometimes, when Frank, who was a frequent
visitor at the cottage, sat watching her at her play, and listening to
her as she talked to herself, as was her constant habit, he could have
shut his eyes and sworn it was his brother's voice calling to him from
the hay-loft or apple tree where they had played together when boys.

Jerry's favorite amusement when alone was to make believe that either
herself, or a figure she had made out of a shawl, was a sick woman,
lying on a settee which she converted into a bed. Sometimes she was the
nurse and took care of the sick woman to whom she always spoke in
German, bending fondly over her, and occasionally holding up before her
a doll which Mrs. St. Claire had given her, and which she played was the
woman's baby. Then she would be the sick woman herself, and trying on
the broad frilled cap which had been found in the trunk, would slip
under the covering, and laying her head upon the pillow, go through with
all the actions of some one very sick, occasionally hugging to her bosom
and kissing the doll.

Once she enacted the pantomime of dying. Folding her hands together and
closing her eyes, her lips moved as if in prayer, for a moment, then
stretching out her feet she lay perfectly motionless, with a set
expression in the little face which looked so comical under the broad
frilled cap. Then, as if it had occurred to her that action was
necessary from some one, she exchanged places with the lay figure, and
tying the cap upon its head, tucked it carefully in the bed, by which
she knelt, and covering her face with her hands imitated perfectly the
sobs and moans of a middle-aged person, mingled occasionally with the
clearer, softer notes of a child's crying.

The first time Frank witnes