"Are you, dear? That will be nice for you."

Instantly Barbara was trembling with excitement. She knew that the
remark had been made to her and not at all to Miss Letts. Barbara
entered once again, and instantly, upon the field of the passions. Here
she was fated by her temperament to be in all cases a miserable victim,
because panic, whether she were accepted or rejected by the object of
her devotion, reduced her to incoherent foolishness; she could only be
foolish now, and, although her heart beat like a leaping animal inside
her, allowed Miss Letts to carry on the conversation.

But Miss Letts's wandering eye hurt Mary's pride. She was not really
interested in her, and once Mary had come to that conclusion about any
one, complete, utter oblivion enveloped them. She perceived, however,
Barbara's agitation, and at that, flattered and appeased, she was
amiable again. There followed between the two a strangled and
disconnected conversation.

Mary began:

"I've got four dolls at home."

"Have you?" breathlessly from Barbara. By such slow accuracies as these
are we conveyed, all our poor mortal days, from realism to romance, and
with a shocking precipitance are we afterwards flung back, out of
romance into realism, our natural home, again.

"Yes--four dolls I have. My mother will give me another if I ask her.
Would your mother?"