Absorbed

Spent the afternoon happily and completely absorbed in my family tree and the life of Alice Pratt Cowan in particular. Her mother died when she was only a few days old and her father subsequently remarried. No further trace of her can be found. 

One of my great aunts has a daughter the same age born in the same city who appears in the census and other records as Alice Pratt Cochrane. However no record of her birth can be found making me wonder whether the two can be the same person - did my great aunt and her husband informally adopt Alice as a baby ? 

I don't suppose I will ever know but am trying establish whether the two families could know each other.