The room was large, though a little low, and was plainly but comfortably furnished; an old-fashioned crimson couch stood in one corner; some stained book-shelves contained a few well-bound books; and one or two simple engravings in cheap frames adorned the wall. In spite of the simplicity of the whole there were evidences of refined taste--there were growing ferns in tall baskets; some red leaves and autumn berries arranged in old china vases; a beautiful head of Clytie, though it was only in plaster of Paris, on the mantel-piece. The pretty tea service on the round table was only white china, hand-painted; and some more red leaves with dark chrysanthemums were tastefully arranged in a low wicker-basket in the center.
One glance would have convinced even a stranger that this room was inhabited by people of cultured taste and small means; and it was so pleasant, so home-like, so warm with ruddy fire-light, that grander rooms would have looked comfortless in comparison. There were only two people in it on this November evening--a girl lying back in a rocking-chair, with her eyes fixed thoughtfully on the dancing flames, and a child of ten, though looking two or three years younger, sitting on a stool before the fire, with a black kitten asleep on her lap, and her arms clasped round her knees.
An odd, weird sort of child, with a head running over with little dark curls, and large wondering eyes--not an ordinary child, and certainly not a pretty one, and looking, at the present moment, with her wrinkled eyebrows and huddled-up figure, like a little old witch in a fairy tale.
"I am that tired," observed the child, apparently apostrophising the kettle, "that not all the monkeys in the Zoölogical Gardens could make me laugh; no, not if they had the old father baboon as their head. I wish I were a jaguar!"
"Why, Fluff?" exclaimed a pleasant voice from the rocking-chair. "Why, Fluff?"
"I wish I were a jaguar," repeated the child, defiantly; "not a bison, because of its hump, nor a camel either. Why, those great spotted cats had their balls to amuse them, and polished ivory bones as well; and the brown bear climbed his pole, and eat buns; no one's mother left it in the dark before the fire, with no one to tell it tales, and only a kettle to talk to a person;" and Fluff curled herself up on her stool with an affronted air.