Holden. "Relax a moment." He turned to look at the girl. He smiled at
her, but she cowered behind her mother's skirt as if she wanted to bury
her face but was afraid to lose sight of what was going on around her.

"What's your name?" asked James.

She retreated, hiding most of her face. Mrs. Bagley stroked her hair and
said, "Now, Martha, come on. Tell the little boy your name."

Purely as a matter of personal pride, James Holden objected to the
"little boy" but he kept his peace because he knew that at eight years
old he was still a little boy. In a soothing way, James said, "Come on
out, Martha. I'll show you some girl-type toys we've got."

The girl's head emerged slowly, "I'm Martha Bagley," she announced.

"How old are you?"

"I'm seven."

"I'm eight," stated James. "Come on."

Mrs. Bagley looked around. She saw that the dirt on the windows was all
on the outside. The inside was clean. So was the room. So were the
curtains. The room needed a dusting--a most thorough dusting. It had been
given a haphazard lick-and-a-promise cleanup not too long ago, but the
cleanup before that had been as desultory as the last, and without a
doubt the one before and the one before that had been of the same sort of
half-hearted cleaning. As a woman and a housekeeper, Mrs. Bagley found
the room a bit strange.