Here was a child who had never played,
“London-Bridge-is-falling-down” or jackstones or jump-rope or
hop-scotch. Yet she talked familiarly of automobiles, yachts and horses.
She knew nothing about geography and yet, her conversation was full of
such phrases as “The spring we were in Paris” or “The winter we spent
in Rome.” She knew nothing about nouns and verbs but she talked Italian
fluently with the hand-organ man who came every week and many of her books
were in French. She knew nothing about fractions or decimals, yet she
referred familiarly to “drawing checks,” to gold eagles and to Wall
Street. Her writing was so bad that the children made fun of it, yet
she could spin off a letter of eight pages in a flash. And she told
the most wonderful fairy-tales that had ever been heard in Primrose
Court.

Because of all these things the children had a kind of contempt for
her mingled with a curious awe.

She was so polite with grown people that it was fairly embarrassing.
She always arose from her chair when they entered the room, always
picked up the things they dropped and never interrupted. And yet she
could carry on a long conversation with them. She never said, “Yes,
ma’am,” or “No, ma’am.” Instead, she said, “Yes, Mrs. Brine,” or
“No, Miss Allison,” and she looked whomever she was talking with
straight in the eye.

She would play with the little children as willingly as with the
bigger ones. Often when the older girls and boys were in school, she
would bring out a lapful of toys and spend the whole morning with
the little ones. When Granny called her, she would give all the toys