"Then I'd better find mother and see what it is all about."
Left to herself Edna waited for what seemed to her a very long time, quite long enough for the affairs of a nation to be settled, and then she went [22] slowly up the stairs, and paused before the open door of her mother's room. To her surprise her parents were talking about something quite different from the subject uppermost in her own mind.
"Edna, dear," said her mother, catching sight of the little figure, "you'd better get ready for dinner. We shall have it a little earlier, so Susan won't be kept so late over the hot fire."
Edna took a step into the room. "Did you ask him?" she said wistfully.
"Ask what? Oh, yes, I forgot dear," she said turning to her husband. "Edna has had a very cordial invitation from Mrs. Ramsey to spend some weeks at the Ramsey's summer home. She and Dorothy Evans are both invited, and I think the Ramseys really will be disappointed if we do not allow Edna to go. What do you think?"
Wasn't it just like mother to put it that way? thought Edna. Surely her father could not be so heartless as to refuse his consent after that.
Her faith in her mother's tact was not misplaced for her father replied: "Why, I think that will be great for Edna. Of course let her go."
"Oh, Mother, Mother, may I? May I?" cried Edna with clasped hands and beseeching eyes.
Her mother turned from the mirror before which she was standing to arrange her hair. "Well, honey," she said. "I think it is decided that you may."
[23] Edna flew to her to bestow a rapturous hug and kiss, and then sped out of the room and downstairs to the telephone. "One, six, seven; ring two," she called in an excited voice.