“You must remember the wretched luncheons he has, Ernie,” I said.
“But he eats them in St. Paul’s churchyard,” retorted Ernie. “A very pleasant spot. And reads the old epitaphs, and goes in to look at the windows afterward.” Then she poured a little of Robin’s milk into a saucer for Rosebud, and set it down on the hearth.
“No,” she soliloquised. “It isn’t fair, and I’m not going to stand it.”
The following day it happened that we were to have lamb stew with barley for dinner. It set on the back of the stove and simmered gently all the afternoon, while every now and again an appetising whiff would be wafted to the dull cold nursery, where Ernie, Mary Hobart, and Robin were gathered about the sewing table in the window playing “Old Maid” and “Tommy-Come-Tickle-Me.” The tip of poor little Ernie’s nose was quite red, her hands were numb and chilly as she dealt the cards. She did not feel in the least convivial. Indeed, she confessed to me later, that, judging from the symptoms going on inside her, she supposed she must be starving, and had only a few hours more to live.
Robin also was restless and inattentive; but Mary Hobart, having lunched comfortably at home, thoroughly enjoyed the game.
“Let’s have another deal,” she cried. “I’ve been Old Maid three times! It’s a shameful slander, and I shan’t go home till my luck changes. Cut, Ernie!”
“It’s getting pretty dark,” hinted Ernie, glancing through the window at the beaconing streetlights. “Won’t your mother worry?”
“Oh, no,” returned Mary, disappointingly. “She knows where I am, and expects me to be late.”
So Robin and Ernie played politely and hungrily on (that stew did smell so good,—um-m!) till at last the gong sounded, and Mary was obliged to go. But even then Ernie must help her into coat and hat, before she could scamper down to join the family in the dining-room.
“Will you have a little stew, Hazard dear?” mother was asking, as Ernie slipped with watchful eyes into her belated place. I had already been served. There were probably three spoonfuls left in the platter. The case was desperate. Ernie, realising this, leaned tragically over, and gave one swift, violent kick beneath the table.