During the days that Mr. Peck had consented to leave Idella with her Annie
took the whole charge of the child, and grew into an intimacy with her
that was very sweet. It was not necessary to this that Idella should be
always tractable and docile, which she was not, but only that she should
be affectionate and dependent; Annie found that she even liked her to be
a little baddish; it gave her something to forgive; and she experienced a
perverse pleasure in discovering that the child of a man so self-forgetful
as Mr. Peck was rather more covetous than most children. It also amused her
that when some of Idella's shabby playmates from Over the Track casually
found their way to the woods past Annie's house, and tried to tempt Idella
to go with them, the child disowned them, and ran into the house from
them; so soon was she alienated from her former life by her present social
advantages. She apparently distinguished between Annie and the Boltons, or
if not quite this, she showed a distinct preference for her company, and
for her part of the house. She hung about Annie with a flattering curiosity
and interest in all she did. She lost every trace of shyness with her, but
developed an intense admiration for her in every way--for her dresses, her
rings, her laces, for the elegancies that marked her a gentlewoman. She
pronounced them prettier than Mrs. Warner's things, and the house prettier
and larger.