“She will probably be the same to me,” said Evelyn; “she has so many of her very own dear ones about her, you know, that it cannot be expected that she will feel much interest in strangers like you and me.  But,” frankly, “I think I should love you best anyhow.”

“How nice in you!” said Lulu, her eyes sparkling; “but I’m afraid you won’t when you know me better, for I’m not a bit good; I get into terrible passions when anybody imposes on me or my brother or sister; and I sometimes disobey and break rules.”

“You are very honest, at all events,” remarked Evelyn pleasantly; “and perhaps I shall not like you any the less for having some faults.  You see, if you were perfect, the contrast between you and myself would be most unpleasant to me.”

“How correctly and like a grown-up person you speak!” said Lulu, regarding her new friend with affectionate admiration.

Evelyn’s eyes filled.  “It is because papa made me his constant companion and took the greatest pains with me,” she said, in tones tremulous with emotion.  “We were almost always alone together, for I never had a brother or sister to share the love he lavished upon me.”

“I’m so, so sorry for you!” said Lulu, slipping an arm round Evelyn’s waist.  “I think I know a little how you feel, for my papa is with us only once in a while for a few days or weeks, and when he goes away again it nearly breaks my heart.”

“But you can hope he may come back again.”

“Yes; and I have Max and Gracie; so I am much better off than you.”

“And such a sweet, pretty mamma,” supplemented Evelyn, sending an admiring glance across the room to where Violet sat chatting with her sister Elsie.

“But you have your own mother, and that’s a great deal better,” returned Lulu.  “Mamma Vi is very beautiful and sweet, and very kind to Max and Gracie and me, but a step-mother can’t be like your own.”

“I suppose not quite,” Evelyn said with a sigh; “but I have no idea when I shall see mine again.”

“We are situated a good deal alike,” remarked Lulu, reflectively.  “My father and your mother are far away in this world, and your father and my mother are gone to heaven.”

“Yes.  Oh, don’t you sometimes want to go to them there?”

“I’m not good enough—­not fit in any way; and I believe I’d rather stay here—­at least while papa does,” Lulu said, with some hesitation.

“I hope he may be spared to you for many, many years,” said Evelyn, gently; “at least till you are quite grown up, and perhaps have a family of children of your own.”

“Were you ever so naughty that your father told you you gave him a great deal of trouble and heartache?” asked Lulu in a tremulous voice and with starting tears.

“Oh no; no, indeed!” exclaimed Eva, in surprise.  “How could I, or any one, with such a father as mine?”

“No father could be better or kinder than mine,” said Lulu, twinkling away a tear; “and yet I have been so passionate and disobedient that he has told me that several times.”