Page:The Other House (London, William Heinemann, 1896), Volume 2.djvu/85

Rh He frankly wondered and admired. "She's magnificent—she's magnificent!" he repeated.

"She's magnificent!" Rose ardently echoed. "Aren't you, my very own?" she demanded of the child, with a sudden passion of tenderness.

"What did he mean about her wanting the Doctor? She'll see us all through—every blessed one of us!" Dennis gave himself up to his serious interest, an odd, voracious manner of taking her in from top to toe.

"You look at her like an ogre!" Rose laughed, moving away from him with her burden and pressing to her lips as she went a little plump pink arm. She pretended to munch it; she covered it with kisses; she gave way to the joy of her renounced abstention. "See us all through? I hope so! Why shouldn't you, darling, why shouldn't you? You've got a real friend, you have, you duck; and she sees you know what you've got by the wonderful way you look at her!" This was to attribute to the little girl's solemn stare a vividness of meaning which moved Dennis to hilarity; Rose's profession of confidence made her immediately turn her round face over her friend's shoulder to the