"
"But you're weakening now. You want to let her have THIS doll."
"It seems like part of--of her inheritance."
"Lock that drawer!"
Aunt Olivia turned the key unhappily. It was not that her "convictions" had changed--it was her heart.
She went up at odd times and looked at the doll the minister's wife
had dressed. She had an unaccountable, uncomfortable feeling that
it was lying there in its coffin--that Rebecca Mary would have said, "She's dead."
It was a handsome doll. Aunt Olivia was not acquainted with dolls,
but she acknowledged that. She admired it unwillingly. She liked
its clothes--the minister's wife had not spared any pains. She had
not stinted in tucks nor ruffles.
Once Aunt Olivia took it out and turned it over in her hands with
critical intent, but there was nothing to criticise. It was a
beautiful doll. She held it with a curious, shy tenderness. But
that time she did not sit down with it. It was the next time.
The rocker was so near the bureau, and Aunt Olivia was tired--and
the doll was already in her arms. She only sat down. For a minute
she sat quite straight and unrelaxed, then she settled back a
little--a little more. The doll lay heavily against her, its
flaxen head touching her breast. After the manner of high-bred
dolls, its eyes drooped sleepily.
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