She made a fairy world for herself, peopled
by characters to whom she gave names, to whom she assigned curious
attributes and qualities. They were as real to her as though flesh and
blood, and she was never lonely, and never cried; and she had buried
herself in her father's heart. She had drawn to her the roughest men in
the troop, and for old Sewell, the grim sergeant, she had a specially
warm place.
"You can love me if you like," she had said to him at the very start,
with the egotism of childhood; but made haste to add, "because I love
you, Gri-Gri." She called him Gri-Gri from the first, but they knew only
long afterwards that "gri-gri" meant "grey-grey," to signify that she
called him after his grizzled hairs.
What she had been in the life-history of Sally and Jim they both knew.
Jim regarded her with an almost superstitious feeling. Sally was his
strength, his support, his inspiration, his bulwark of defence; Nancy was
the charm he wore about his neck--his mascot, he called her. Once, when
she was ill, he had suffered as he had never done before in his life.
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