was walkin' along, and there in her hammock sits Evelyn as fat as Mrs. Mullen's pig, and dressed up in a peekaboo waist, fitting her like a bolster, and under my nose she calls to Sara, and Sara in spite o' me runs in ahead, an' she give her a peanut. An' right then and there her young man up and kisses her in broad daylight. An' 'Evelyn Dearie,' says he, an' there stands Sara, her mouth as wide open as if to swallow an oyster. An' out of her mind Evelyn Dearie won't go."
Perhaps it was because of the origin of her name that Evelyn Dearie was less shy than other make-believe children.
For a while she hovered around the edge of the family circle. She made especially free of the nursery and of Alice's room. Alice, deluded woman, encouraged this. She even felt flattered when Sara would ask her,
"Do you mind if Evelyn Dearie lies down in your bed a little while? She feels tired."
Finally, after these tentative entrances into reality, Evelyn suddenly broke down all barriers, and not in the way to make Tom Marcey recognize her poetic value.
Tom came home tired from his office. He was about to seat himself in his accustomed chair when Sara gave an ear-piercing shriek. Sara was a very accomplished shrieker.
"Oh!" she screamed, "don't sit down there, don't, don't sit down there!"
A bystander would have supposed that a child was being flayed alive. Tom jumped up and looked apprehensively behind him. The chair was empty. He started to sit down again.
"O-o-o-oh, you're sitting down on Evelyn Dearie!" cried Sara. "Evelyn Dearie's in the chair! Don't do it!"
Alice gave her husband a look which means—"Do
