"Yes," responded Baffin, "I remembered to get the muffins, and I've also remembered to get an empty flour-sack. Know what that's for?"
Prudence shook her head--gravely, wonderingly.
"To smother up tiresome girls in that _will_ wriggle and _will_ talk," explained Baffin.
"He! he!" giggled Prudence. "Wown't tie up _me_, I know. 'Cos if you was to do that you couldn't paint me. See?" She gurgled with triumph.
"And now," said Baffin, "it is time to leave off playing. Sit up, like a good girl, and keep quiet. Get rid of that bull's-eye."
"Yes," said Prudence. And the lollipop was "got rid of" of by a simple and effective means. "I _should_ laugh if someone was to tread on it," observed Prudence. "If my mother was to see---- Oo-er, Mr. Baffin, down't 'oller at me, please, Mr. Baffin. I _will_ be good, I will; on'y, if you look like that I shall cry, 'Cos you frighten me."
Silence reigned for a little space, whilst Prudence, with clenched hands, maintained an attitude of strenuous repose. Baffin's actions alternated between brief and seemingly motiveless dabs at his canvas, and a critical inspection of his model, for the purposes of which he spread out his legs and wagged his head--slowly and pensively, from side to side--like an elderly cockerel surveying the domestic landscape. This proceeding terminated in a sigh that had all the eloquence of a shout, and Baffin pounced, as it were, upon his canvas.
Prudence selected this moment in which to throw up both her hands, and wail with sorrow. "Ooh," she moaned, "ooh, I am a bad gel, I am. Ooh, what will my mother say when I go 'ome? She give me a letter to powst, she did, an' I never powsted it, an' it's a letter for our landlord, it is, an' I promised faithful to put it into the first box I come to. An' now I've fogot it, I 'ave, an' my mother 'll be cross. An' I love my mother, I do, an' she's got a bad place on her arm, an' I am a bad, wicked gel to tease an' trouble 'er, I am. Oo-er, I must get up and go out, Mr. Baffin. I must, 'cause I fogot to powst my mother's letter."
Baffin did the philosophic thing: put away his canvas, and put on the kettle, and invited his sitter to unsit and rejoice. That young person responded to this invitation by sitting wonderfully silent--strangely still--for ten minutes. It was only at the very end of this unique performance that we perceived her to be shedding tears. Real tears, this time.