I had never had anything to do with a little
girl before, I thought she was more beautiful and wonderful and bright
than anything else could possibly be in life, and she found me the
gentlest of slaves--though at the same time, as I made evident, fairly
strong. And Nannie was amazed to find the afternoon slip cheerfully and
rapidly away. She praised my manners to Lady Drew and to my mother,
who said she was glad to hear well of me, and after that I played with
Beatrice several times. The toys she had remain in my memory still as
great splendid things, gigantic to all my previous experience of toys,
and we even went to the great doll's house on the nursery landing to
play discreetly with that, the great doll's house that the Prince Regent
had given Sir Harry Drew's first-born (who died at five), that was a not
ineffectual model of Bladesover itself, and contained eighty-five dolls
and had cost hundreds of pounds. I played under imperious direction with
that toy of glory.
I went back to school when that holiday was over, dreaming of beautiful
things, and got Ewart to talk to me of love; and I made a great story
out of the doll's house, a story that, taken over into Ewart's hands,
speedily grew to an island doll's city all our own.
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