smile, a perfect beam, no less.

"I'm here!" that happy smile seemed to say. "Why don't you like me?"

There was something so quaint, so unexpected about that smile that Linda
smiled herself. But she checked herself and said to the boy coldly, "I
don't like babies."

"Don't like babies?" The boy couldn't believe her. "Don't like me? " He
waved his arms foolishly at his mother.

Linda dropped off her chair on to the grass.

"Why do you keep on smiling?" she said severely. "If you knew what I was
thinking about, you wouldn't."

But he only squeezed up his eyes, slyly, and rolled his head on the pillow.
He didn't believe a word she said.

"We know all about that!" smiled the boy.

Linda was so astonished at the confidence of this little creature...Ah no,
be sincere. That was not what she felt; it was something far different, it
was something so new, so...The tears danced in her eyes; she breathed in a
small whisper to the boy, "Hallo, my funny!"

But by now the boy had forgotten his mother. He was serious again.
Something pink, something soft waved in front of him. He made a grab at it
and it immediately disappeared. But when he lay back, another, like the
first, appeared. This time he determined to catch it. He made a