"Nurse is not to be sent away!" Christina exclaimed.
Had a thunderbolt fallen out of a mild spring shower of rain, Mrs. Maclahan could not have been more astonished; but Christina was too excited to note anything.
"I can't have Nurse leave me! I would rather you left me," she passionately went on. "I will do anything if you let Nurse stop! She doesn't coddle me and make me afraid! I will ride that big horse every day, I will do sport if you teach me, I will do everything you want; but I love her, I love her, and she mustn't leave me!"
She stood there with crimson cheeks and heaving breast, then catching her father's eye, she flung herself upon him with a passion of tears:
"I will be a Maclahan! I'll never, never, never be afraid any more, father, if you let Nurse stay with me!"
"I have seen no signs of fear in you yet," said her father, laughing. "Why, Ena, did you think this white-cheeked, demure-faced baby carried such a tempestuous little heart within her? I think we must come to some arrangement with poor Nurse."
"I'm afraid," said Mrs. Maclahan with a short little laugh, as she went on writing her letters, and did not glance at Christina—"I am afraid that the child has expressed the case quite clearly. It is a question of Nurse's departure or mine! I am quite convinced that both of us will not be able to live in the same house."
"Come along with me to the library, Christina; I found a book to-day that I think you would like."
And before she could say another word, Christina found herself carried off by her father to her favourite room.
"Now," he said, placing before her an old red leather volume, "these are some old Norse legends, translated more than three hundred years ago, and the pictures are very quaint."