But just here the Idol came and stood in the door with Lovelace Peyton on his shoulder, whom he let slide down him to the floor.  Now, a month ago, I would rather have had anything happen to me than to sit in the presence of Mr. Douglass Byrd, but all that reverential awe has gone—­changed, the awe gone and only reverence left.  As we feared, he has bought the new spring clothes, but we see no alarming signs of affection toward Helena Kirby yet developed by them.  How magnificent he is in them, is beyond my pen to describe to you, Louise.

“What has Miss Belle done that needs an expression of appreciation on just this particular day of May?” he asked, with that delightful interest he always shows in all of us—­Roxanne’s friends.

And while it is trying in a way to girls whose dresses are still just at their shoe tops to be called “Miss,” we never resent it from him, because it denotes real respect and not teasing like it does from some of our friends and older relations.  It is a very thin line that separates ridicule from affectionate interest in girls of our age, but he is always on the right side.

“The reason Phyllis wants to do something nice for Belle is that she has the kind of disposition that requires more to make her a friend than the rest of us.  It has to be something that will shock her into seeing how fond of her Phyllis is.”  Roxanne’s explanation was so well expressed that the Idol saw the point and reason immediately.

“You want to throw a kind of bombshell friendship into the camp of her prejudices, Miss Phyllis,” he said with his mouth twitching with a laugh, as if he didn’t know whether we would like it or not.

“Yes, that is just what I want—­an explosion, and I can’t think of anything but a gold bracelet or a ring, neither of which is a skyrocket,” I answered with the flow of wit that always comes in the presence of the Idol, and which, I am sure, is just a reflection of his genius.

“I know a explode that I can git you, Phyllie,” said Lovelace Peyton, looking up from the bottle he was trying to get into his apron pocket, his attention having been caught by the word that interested his scientific mind.

“Not the kind Miss Phyllis wants, bug-doctor,” the Idol answered with a laugh, as he filled his bag with tobacco that he keeps in a queer old jar which the Douglass grandfathers brought from England before the Revolution.

“I kin git a ’splode that Phyllie wants,” answered Lovelace Peyton indignantly.  “Phyllie always wants what I git her, even squirms; don’t you, Phyllie?”

“Yes, I do,” I answered quickly, for I can’t even write how precious to me is the way Lovelace Peyton treats me with confidence.  He comes to me now just as he goes to Roxanne for things he wants, strings or sympathy, and I keep a supply of both on hand for him.  And when he brings dreadful bugs and things I never let my heart quake—­that is, so he will notice it.  A woolly caterpillar was the last test that I stood for him.