She usually wore print or gingham, while her undergarments, numerous and beautifully made, were of a material so coarse and strong as to cause surprise to strangers, but to those who had the misfortune to know the little vixen, Marie, these coarse skirts, pantalettes and chemises, stoutly stitched with about thirty-six cotton, were luminous with meaning, suggesting as they did the dread possibility of _tantrums_ on the part of said vixen, Marie.
Dinah was complete save for her shoes, which were already cut from a pair of old kid gloves, and her name. I remember her creator wished to call her Lillian, but with all the wisdom of my five full-fledged years well to the fore, I suggested that it would be well for all of us to leave the christening to Miss Marie, herself. And she of thirty-five years bent her head to my five, and the name of Lillian floated back to the limbo from which it had been so briefly called. As the second shoe was taken up, Marie showed signs of waking, and the newly created one was thrust into my hands, and I was told to go and give it to the little tot. But deep down in my soul I said, “Nay! Nay!” for mark you, I was a canny child, and ten years of life’s experiences had been crowded into my five of actual time, and hell and bitter punishments took prominent places in the religion thus far made known to me. I said to myself therefore: “This child _is_ wicked, for all she is so pretty, she’s _awful_, and if for her punishment she is to be frightened to death by the sight of this nameless thing, I don’t intend to be the instrument used in her undoing!” So, swiftly I crept to the great crib-bed, and in a moment crept away again, leaving across her stomach, like a hideous nightmare, that “deed without a name,” and then I fled to the hall and waited for things, behind the partly open door; wondering which of the little cups and glasses on a stand by the bed, holding cooling drinks, would strike the door first. I waited and watched. Marie’s eyes opened, a scowl instantly darkened her face; in a querulous tone she asked, “Is my mamma, home, now?”
The voice of the sempstress answered gently, “No, dear,” and a light like sunshine came into her brilliant eyes; she smiled sweetly and asked, “Where’s my Cawie?” her name for me, and as near as she could get to Carrie, and then she felt the weight across her, and the moment had come!