Mrs. Willis counted for nothing at all with Nan--she did not consider her of the smallest importance and after giving her a quick glance of some disdain she began to trot round the room on a voyage of discovery. Any moment Annie would come back--Annie had, indeed, probably gone to fetch the kitten, and would quickly return with it. She walked slowly round and round, keeping well away from that part of the room where Mrs. Willis sat. Presently she found a very choice little china jug, which she carefully abstracted with her small fingers from a cabinet, which contained many valuable treasures. She sat down on the floor exactly beneath the cabinet, and began to play with her jug. She went through in eager pantomime a little game which Annie had invented for her, and imagined that she was a little milkmaid, and that the jug was full of sweet new milk; she called out to an imaginary set of purchasers, "Want any milk?" and then she poured some by way of drops of milk into the palm of her little hand, which she drank up in the name of her customers with considerable gusto. Presently knocking the little jug with some vehemence on the floor she deprived it with one neat blow of its handle and spout. Mrs. Willis was busily writing, and did not look up. Nan was not in the least disconcerted; she said aloud: