Luretta agreed soberly, thinking that to the rabbits she must have seemed a giant.
“Father will say ’twas best to let them go, whatever Paul says,” she added, and promising to meet the next day the friends parted.
Anna danced along the path in her old fashion, quite forgetting Melvina’s measured steps. Everything was all right now. She and Luretta were friends; Mrs. Foster had pardoned her; and the liberty pole was found. So she was smiling and happy as she pushed open the door and entered the pleasant kitchen, expecting to see her mother and Rebby; but no one was there. The room looked deserted. She opened the door leading into the front room and her happy smile vanished.
Her mother sat there, looking very grave and anxious; and facing the kitchen door and looking straight at Anna was Mrs. Lyon, while on a stool beside her sat Melvina, her flounced linen skirt and embroidered white sunbonnet as white as a gull’s breast.
Anna looked from one to the other wonderingly. Of course, she thought, Mrs. Lyon had come to call her a mischievous girl on account of the rabbits. All her happiness vanished; and when her mother said: “Come in, Anna. Mrs. Lyon has come on purpose to speak with you,” she quite forgot to curtsy to the minister’s wife, and stood silent and afraid.
CHAPTER XI
AN EXCHANGE OF VISITS
“IT is Mr. Lyon’s suggestion,” concluded Mrs. Lyon, “and Melvina is eager to come and live with you, Mrs. Weston, if Anna is ready to come to me.”