she felt for Ida.

And her mother had told her that she must lend Ida to Connie Hancock if
Connie wanted her.

Mamma couldn't see that such a thing was not possible.

"My darling, you mustn't be selfish. You must do what your little guest
wants."

"I can't."

But she had to; and she was sent out of the room because she cried. It was
much nicer upstairs in the nursery with Mimi, the Angora cat. Mimi knew
that something sorrowful had happened. He sat still, just lifting the root
of his tail as you stroked him. If only she could have stayed there with
Mimi; but in the end she had to go back to the drawing-room.

If only she could have told Mamma what it felt like to see Connie with Ida
in her arms, squeezing her tight to her chest and patting her as if Ida
had been _her_ child. She kept on saying to herself that Mamma didn't
know; she didn't know what she had done. And when it was all over she took
the wax doll and put her in the long narrow box she had come in, and
buried her in the bottom drawer in the spare-room wardrobe. She thought:
If I can't have her to myself I won't have her at all. I've got Emily. I
shall just have to pretend she's not an idiot.

She pretended Ida was dead; lying in her pasteboard coffin and buried in
the wardrobe cemetery.