Page:Emma Speed Sampson--The shorn lamb.djvu/15

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A Multiplicity of Parents
11

would occupy the apartment with me, but she was sure it would be a lady. Mrs. O'Shea is most particular. She is the most ladyfiedish person in the world. She told me I mustn't talk to anyone on the train unless it was the lady who was in the apartment with me or a man in brass buttons. Of course since you are not a lady I shall have to pretend you are to talk to you. Mrs. O'Shea would not have me to be rude to the person who was going to keep house with me. Mrs. O'Shea is terribly particular about manners."

"And who is Mrs. O'Shea?" asked Philip, who was feeling like laughing again and wondering how he would hide it.

"Oh! she is a lady friend," replied the child primly, "almost the only perfect lady friend Daddy and I had. We had lots of nice men friends and a few painty and modelly girls we liked a lot, but Mrs. O'Shea can't abide 'em, and after Daddy died she wouldn't let me see any of them. She just took matters in her own hands and managed some mourning clothes for me, and wrote to my grandfather down in Virginia, and got me a ticket and put me on the train. Mrs. O'Shea is a terribly managy person. Not that I am not very grateful to her for taking so much interest in me, but I wanted