The Girls and I by Mary Louisa Molesworth — Read

I'm Jack. I've always been Jack, ever since I can remember at least, though I suppose I must have been called 'Baby' for a bit before Serena came. But she's only a year and a half younger than me, and Maud's only a year and a quarter behind her, so I can scarcely remember even Serena being 'Baby'; and Maud's always been so very grown up for her age that you couldn't fancy her anything but 'Maud.'

My real name isn't John though, as you might fancy. It's a much queerer name, but there's always been one of it in our family ever since some grandfather or other married a German girl, who called her eldest son after her own father. So we're accustomed to it, and it doesn't seem so queer to us as to other people. It's 'Joachim. ' 'Jock' seems a better short for it than 'Jack,' doesn't it? and I believe mother once meant to call me 'Jock. ' But when Serry and Maud came I _had_ to be Jack, for with Anne and Hebe in front of me, and the two others behind, of course I was 'Jack-in-the-middle. ' There's never been any more of us, and even if there had I'd have stayed Jack, once I'd got settled into it, you see.