Jean Webster

“ Georgie acknowledged.
"Thank you," said Patty. "If you had a brother like Tommy Wyatt you would know how to sympathize with me. I suppose I ought to be grateful to know that the dog is dead, but I should like to have had the news broken a little less gently."
"Patty," exclaimed Priscilla, as a sudden thought struck her, "do you happen to remember that you are on the reception committee of the Dramatic Club cotillion to-morrow night? What will Mrs. Richards think when she sees you in evening dress, receiving at a party, on the very day your fiancé has been buried?" ”

“ After working like a little buzz-saw making tissue-paper favors for the thing, I hate to have to miss it just because my brother's bull pup, that I never even liked, is dead.
"I'll go," she added, brightening, "and receive the guests with a forced and mechanical smile; and every time I feel the warden's eyes upon me I shall with difficulty choke back the tears, and she will say to herself:
"'Brave girl! How nobly she is struggling to present a composed face to the world! ”

“ Thomas M. Wyatt.
"Thomas M. Wyatt," sai d Patty, grimly, "is my small brother Tommy, and Robert is short for Bobby Shafto, which was the name of Tommy's bull pup, the homeliest and worst-tempered dog that was ever received into the bosom of a respectable family."}}
"But why in the world did he telegraph?"
"It's a joke," said Patty, shaking her head dejectedly. "Joking runs in the family, and we've all inherited the tendency. One time my father—but, as my friend Kipling says, that's another story. This dog, you see—this Robert Shafto—has cast a shadow over my vacations for more than a year. ”