“I oughtn’t kept you waiting,” she said; and then she explained shamefacedly, “I wasn’t saying my prayers for good.  I was just saying them over and over for lonesome.  It’s—­it’s such a big night in here all by myself.”

Mrs. Patterson gave her a good-night kiss and turned the covers back for her to snuggle in bed.  And there—­wonder of wonders!—­there lay in the bed a whiterobed figure—­a dear, beautiful, smiling baby doll.  Anne looked at it for one breathless minute and then clasped it close.

“You precious! you lovely!” she exclaimed.  “Is—­is she my own baby?”

“Yes, she’s yours,” Mrs. Patterson assured her.  “She came to take the place of Rosy Posy who had to stay at home.  She hasn’t ’long yellow curls’ like Rosy Posy, but you see she’s young yet—­only a baby in long dresses.  I think maybe her hair will grow.”

Hugging the baby doll tight in one arm, Anne threw the other around Mrs. Patterson’s neck, and kissed her again and again.

“You are so good.  You are so good,” she said over and over.

“What are you going to call your new baby?” asked Miss Drayton.

“I’d like to name her for you,” Anne said, looking at Mrs. Patterson.

Mrs. Patterson smiled.  “My name is Emily,” she said.

“Then that’s her name.  Mrs. Emily Patterson.  Only—­” there was a thoughtful pause—­“that does sound sorter ’dicalous for a baby in a long dress.”

“Call her Emily Patterson,” suggested the doll’s namesake.

But Anne shook her head.  “That wouldn’t sound ’spectful,” she objected; “and Patterson is your ‘Mrs.’ name.”  Then her face brightened.  “Oh!  Her name can be Mrs. Emily Patterson, and I’ll call her a pet name.  I don’t like nicknames, but pet names are dear.  She shall be what Aunt Charity used to call me—­’Honey-Sweet.’  I can sing it like she did:—­

          “’Honey, honey!  Sweet, sweet, sweet! 
          Honey, honey!  Honey-Sweet!’”

As Anne crooned the words over and over, her voice sank drowsily.  When Miss Drayton went a few minutes later to turn out the light, Anne was fast asleep, smiling in her dreams at Honey-Sweet who lay smiling on the pillow beside her.

CHAPTER V

The shipboard day passed, uneventful and pleasant.  Anne had made for herself an explanation of her uncle’s absence, which no one had heart to correct.

“He’s nawful busy, Uncle Carey is,” she explained.  “I reckon he stayed there talking to Roger—­he always has so many things to tell Roger to do!—­and the boat was gone before he knew it.  So he just had to wait.  I ’spect he’ll come on one of those other boats.  Wouldn’t it be funny if one of them would come splashing along right now and Uncle Carey would wave his hand at me and say ‘Hello, Nancy pet!  Here I am.’”