"'Course not," he answered, with an indignant look. "I'm not a girl
- and I'm nearly nine, too."

"I gather from your tone that you are not partial to the sex - you don't
like girls, eh, Imp?"

"Should think not," he returned; silly things, girls are. There's Dorothy,
you know; we were playing at executions the other day - she was Mary
Queen of Scots an' I was the headsman. I made a lovely axe with wood
and silver paper, you know; and when I cut her head off she cried awfully,
and I only gave her the weeniest little tap - an' they sent me to bed at six
o'clock for it. I believe she cried on purpose - awfully caddish, wasn't it?"

"My dear Imp," said I, "the older you grow, the more the depravity of the
sex will become apparent to you."

"Do you know, I like you," he said, regarding me thoughtfully, "I think
you are fine."

"Now that's very nice of you, Imp; in common with my kind I have a
weakness for flattery-please go on."

"I mean, I think you are jolly."

"As to that," I said, shaking my head and sighing, "appearances are
often very deceptive; at the heart of many a fair blossom there is
a canker worm."

"I'm awfull' fond of worms, too," said the Imp.