Page:Hollyhock house; a story for girls (IA hollyhockhousest00tagg).pdf/127

Rh the difference. Couldn’t you possibly find a little name for me that would be suitable, yet not so solemn as mother, girls? Somehow I think I’ll never get used to being called mother.”

“And it’s so lovely!” Jane exclaimed before she thought, then could have bitten her tongue out for having spoken. Instantly she felt that this request summed up the situation: they must think of this pretty creature as something else than mother, something that expressed their protection for her, not implying dependence upon her.

“I’ve been thinking mother didn’t suit,” said Florimel, with her usual candour. “Would Madrina do? Madre is mother, and ina is a ‘little’-whatever-it’s-put-to, isn’t it? That calls you our little mother, like the sort of a toy mother you’ll be, I guess.”

“Toy mother! Oh, Florimel! But perhaps that’s what I am,” laughed Mrs. Garden.

“Mother sounds less serious in French and Italian than it does in German and English,” said Jane.

“Do you know languages, children?” asked Mrs. Garden.

“Not even one, though we can make ourselves understood in English,” Mary said.