We're going to stop at Mrs. Gelbraith's and ask a strange little
girl to come to your party, this afternoon."
"Who?"
"Her name is Fanchon. She's Mrs. Gelbraith's little niece."
"What makes her so queer?"
"I didn't say she's queer."
"You said----"
"No; I mean that she is a stranger. She lives in New York and has come
to visit here."
"What's she live in New York for?"
"Because her parents live there. You must be very nice to her, Penrod;
she has been very carefully brought up. Besides, she doesn't know the
children here, and you must help to keep her from feeling lonely at your
party."
"Yes'm."
When they reached Mrs. Gelbraith's, Penrod sat patiently humped upon a
gilt chair during the lengthy exchange of greetings between his mother.
and Mrs. Gelbraith. That is one of the things a boy must learn to bear:
when his mother meets a compeer there is always a long and dreary wait
for him, while the two appear to be using strange symbols of speech,
talking for the greater part, it seems to him, simultaneously, and
employing a wholly incomprehensible system of emphasis at other times
not in vogue. Penrod twisted his legs, his cap and his nose.
"Here she is!" Mrs. Gelbraith cried, unexpectedly, and a dark-haired,
demure person entered the room wearing a look of gracious social
expectancy. In years she was eleven, in manner about sixty-five,
and evidently had lived much at court. She performed a curtsey in
acknowledgment of Mrs.
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