Babe put her head on one side. "Oh, say, Sheila, why bother about Dickie.
Nobody cares about Dickie. He'll get a proper bawlin'-out from Poppa
to-morrow. But I'd think myself simple to be scared by him. He's
harmless. The poor kid can't half help himself now. He got started when
he was awful young."

"Oh," said Sheila, as sharply as before, stopping before Babe, "I'm not
frightened. I'm angry--angry at myself. I _like_ Dickie. I like him!"

Babe's lips fell apart. She sat down in the accordion-plaited chair and
rocked. A squealing, shaking noise accompanied the motion. Her fingers
sought and found against the chair-back a piece of chewing-gum which she
had stuck there during her last visit to Sheila. Babe hid and resurrected
chewing-gum as instinctively as a dog hides and resurrects his bones.

"I can _see_ you likin' Dickie," she remarked ironically.

"But I do, I tell you! He was sweet. He didn't say a word or do a thing
to frighten me--"

"But he was full, Shee, you know he was."

"Yes. He'd been drinking. I smelt it. And he didn't walk very straight,
and he was a little mixed in his speech. But, all the same, he was as
good as gold. And friendly and nice. I might have walked home quietly
with him and sent him away at the door. And he wouldn't have been seen by
his father." Sheila's eyes filled. "It was dreadful--to--to knock him
down the steps!"

"Say, if you'd had as much to put up with from Dickie as Poppa's had--"