“Oh, thank you, Georgie dear,” I said, kissing his little ruddy face. “What made you think to bring it over?”
“I wanted him to have something to ’muse himself with,” said Georgie, “and mamma said I might, if only I would stop teasing.”
“It was very kind of you, honey,” I answered, and Georgie beamed.
Sometimes I am ready to admit that I am unjust to Georgie. It isn’t his fault that he has all the things I want for Robin, to be sure.
And now I must write something that I dread to put down in black and white;—but there is no use shirking. We have to face it. The Hancocks are going! The news came quite unexpectedly to us all, and it is nobody’s fault.
Mrs. Hancock saw mother this evening, and explained that Mr. Hancock’s married sister had come to the city and taken a furnished house, and it had always been understood between them that when this happened she and Mr. Hancock would rent a floor. She said she was really sorry to leave us, that she had no complaints to make; but they were anxious to be settled before Christmas, and felt obliged to give up their rooms next Saturday. That would give us a whole week in which to rent them, and she hoped we would have no trouble.
But, oh dear! we haven’t even had any applications for Mrs. Hudson’s room yet. It seems to be an unlucky season, or something, and when the Hancocks go, I don’t see how we are going to get on at all!
We will have only Miss Brown left, and she pays less than anybody else because her room is so small. Can a family of seven people live on ten dollars a week? That sounds like a problem in a Lady’s Magazine; but I fancy the answer will prove very different from those printed, if we are unlucky enough to have to try it.
“I have such a queer feeling whenever I look at Miss Brown,” confessed Ernie, as we put away the dinner dishes,—Rose having begged for an unexpected afternoon out. “Sort of as if we were a Cannibal family, and she was the last captive we had left. Just think, she means muttonchops, and beefsteak, and milk for Robin, and butter, and eggs, and everything except rent! We must guard her carefully, Elizabeth, and see to it that she does not escape!”
Poor Miss Brown! I had had somewhat the same feeling myself, though I would not have thought of expressing it in exactly Ernie’s words.