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"Come and have a game at soldiers, Dulcie."
"I can't, Harold; don't you see I'm busy?"
"Busy writing rubbish! How you can be so silly as to waste your time
like that I can't think. It isn't as if you really _could_ write
poetry, and I call it downright conceited for a girl to pretend she
can. So, do leave off, there's a dear, and come and have a game. I
want to try my new cannon, and you shall have first shot if you will
come."
But Dulcie was offended. A week ago she had written a verse about
Harold's dog, and father had said it was very good and had given her
sixpence for writing it. Since then she had spent most of her spare
time trying to write other verses, but this afternoon she was
beginning to get a little tired of being a poetess and to long for a
good game.
When Harold suggested soldiers, she really wanted to play, for she was
almost as fond of boys' games as her brother was; but she thought it
sounded grand to pretend she was busy. Then when Harold called her
silly and conceited she grew angry and sulked.
"Do come, Dulcie; don't be cross!"
"Go away, you rude boy," replied Dulcie.
Harold tried coaxing for a little while longer, and then he went away
and left his sister alone in the school-room. It was very lonely
there, and before five minutes had passed Dulcie heartily regretted
that she had refused Harold's offer.
"But he _was_ horrid," she said, "and anyway _he_ is miserable too; he
can't bear playing alone."
Harold, however, was anything but miserable, for, on peeping out of
the window, Dulcie saw him in the next-door garden helping the
children there to make a big snow-man. He was laughing and shouting,
and had evidently forgotten all about her.
A lump seemed to have suddenly risen in her throat, and as she crept
back to the table two big tears fell splashing down upon the poem she
had been trying to write and blotted out some of the words; then down
went her head upon the paper, and in another moment she was sobbing
pitifully.
It was almost dark when Harold came running up to the school-room,
and, bursting open the door, cried cheerily: "Such a lark, Dulcie;
just listen. Hullo," he added, "what's the matter?"
In another moment his arm was round his sister's neck and she was
rubbing her tear-stained cheek against his cold rosy one.
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"O, Harold," she sobbed, "I've been so miserable. I'm sorry I was so
disagreeable."
"Never mind; is _that_ all you're crying about? Well, I was horrid
too: I teased you when you were writing, and I daresay your poetry
_is_ clever."
"No, it isn't," said Dulcie; "it's as stupid as stupid can be, and
I'll never try to write a piece again," and with that she picked up
the offending paper and dropped it into the fire.
Harold gave her a brotherly hug, for he really was glad Dulcie had
come to this decision, for he had found her new accomplishment a
little trying at times.
"But I haven't told you my news yet," he said. "I've been playing with
the Grahams all the afternoon, and Mrs. Graham came out just now and
has invited us to go there to tea and have a good game afterwards, and
Tom told me there was to be a Christmas-tree. So come along and let's
tell nurse, for it's time to get ready."
O, what a good time the children had that evening, and how they did
laugh and play! Dulcie was amongst the merriest there, and when she
and Harold went home that night, laden with toys from the
Christmas-tree, she said: "Wasn't I a silly girl to sit and cry and be
miserable this afternoon, when I might have been so happy?"
_L. L. Weedon._