Page:Georgie by Dorothea Deakin, 1906.djvu/147

The International "Oh, Georgie, you've hurt him! Let me do it. Dear little lad, he's only half awake."

She ruffled up his heavy hair with her quick fingers and pushed his hat back a little. I suppose her glowing face, fresh and pretty and kind under his sleepy eyes, disarmed him, for he stopped crying and smiled at her. She hugged him.

"He is a darling," she said with sudden enthusiasm. "Really, when he grins in that delicious way, I don't wonder at you, Georgie. Don't call him Taffy. Taffy was a thief, you know."

"People never grow up to fit their names," Georgie said gloomily. "Look at me. There's nothing solid and British and conventional about me, you know. I'm not narrow, or conservative, or obstinate. George is a very kind of name."

I thought of a possible Georgie, twenty years ahead, and smiled to myself.

But Drusilla looked gravely from the stern young face to the little boy, and 131