Patricia

Patricia sat on the back fence, almost hidden by the low-spreading branches of an old apple-tree. Below her, on the grass, lay a small, curly, black dog, his brown, trustful eyes fixed confidently on Patricia. "Really, you know," the child said, gravely, "it's a very perplexing situation. Aunt Julia needn't have been so inhospitable. Why didn't I wait until Daddy got home! Daddy's so much more-convincible. But it's no use now; Daddy never goes back on Aunt Julia." Patricia slipped from the fence. "I rather think you and I'd better go down to the back meadow to talk things over; it's getting pretty near sewing-time." Out in the meadow, flat on her back in the long grass, Patricia set herself to the task of solving this perplexing situation. Half an hour earlier she had appeared back from one of her desultory rambles, accompanied by this most forlorn of all forlorn dogs, explaining that she had met him on the road, and he had followed her home. It was no unusual occurrence, but when Patricia added that he didn't seem to belong to anybody, and she thought she would keep him, Miss Kirby promptly and firmly protested. To Patricia's pleading, that he was poor and lame and homeless, that Cæsar, the pointer, was the only dog they had now, and he was too old to play much, Miss Kirby had proved adamant. Patricia might give her foundling a good meal, but keep him she could not.