“Then she must go away. Let me see—among the mountains somewhere, to an old farm-house where she can have milk, and sweet corn, and sleep eighteen hours out of the twenty-four. She must not take a stitch of sewing.”
“Splendid!” I declared, clapping my hands.
“Oh,” exclaimed Nelly, “won’t you go to Auntie Vandevere’s, mamma? They want you to come so much.”
“Now there is a place provided,” said Mrs. Whitcomb. “You know you were going all last summer and did not get started. It is just the season to enjoy yourself. The girls and I can keep house. We will have everything bright as a new gilt button on your return.—And Edith is so good, or you might take one of the children to mind her. Children come in so handy.”
“O mamma, me!” and Tim jumped up and down as incoherently as her sentence.
“The house cleaning—” protested mamma faintly, Tim’s arms being around her neck in a strangling fashion by this time.
“We will clean house, mend the stockings, weed the flower beds, and keep matters straight. You will hardly know the place when you return.”
“Here, Tim, look after your village! Baby has commenced to devour the cows, and I think them a rather heavy article of diet for her just yet.”
“What is one little make-believe cow?” said Tim disdainfully.
“Well, pick up the fragments. And here is Miss Dolly looking tired and sleepy. Then run out and play.”