There were so many lovely pagodas in the window, and some of them were several feet high. She would like one of these, but knew she might as well long for the moon. There was something in the window which she would rather have than a pagoda or anything else, and she longed for it so intensely that a real prayer must have gone out from her little innocent heart. It was a doll!--a Chinese doll, with big slanting eyes, like Kon Ying’s own, and the most gorgeous dress of flowered silk.
Suddenly it dawned upon her what she would do when she got home. Instead of praying to the god on the shelf she would pray to the moon rabbit, and beg and beg of it to bring her a doll. If she could only have one of those gorgeous creatures, with the tuft of black hair on its head, and the wobbly feet and arms, and painted cheeks and lips, she would surely never ask for anything else. There were other dolls in plenty, but none so beautiful. They were only bits of wood, with eyes, nose, and mouth painted on them. If she had not seen the big one she might have cared for those, but now--she would never care for them; she had seen the queen.
She gasped out, in her shrill childish voice: “Oh, _mo chun_! Why--why--won’t the moon labbit bling me doll?”
Before the mother could reply, a kind hand was laid upon the polished head of the little girl, and a man’s kind voice said: “The moon labbit _will_ bling you doll, and all the little sistehs too.”
Looking up, she saw that the voice came from the lips of a notorious highbinder--a friend of her father’s.
The man had been to their home many times. She had liked him, for he always had a kind word for children, and last New Year he had even brought them some cunning little mandarin oranges, and a package of Chinese candy. He was said to be a very bad man, but he loved children. Speaking a few words of holiday greeting, he passed on into the shop, while Kon Ying and her sisters still gazed at the contents of the windows.
The big doll seemed to be saying: “I am yours, Kon Ying!--take me!” while it held out its wobbly arms in entreaty. Its painted lips seemed as if they might be forming pretty Chinese words of good wishes for the Moon Festival.
Kon Ying’s little celestial heart longed for it with a terrible longing, but the glass was between them, and so--her heart could only ache in silence. It could not happen, anyway. When did anything nice ever happen to her? She had always been in the way, and there were no toys to spare for her--little “Enough Hawks.”