"Nurse does that."
Christina's tone was a little doubtful.
"Ah! You wait and see!" said Miss Bertha, nodding her head. "Fathers and mothers are like nobody else! If I had mine alive now, how happy I should be!"
There was a little silence, which Dawn broke.
"My mother is alive though we can't see her. She takes care of dad and me. And my toad has lost himself, Tina; and Porky, the big black pig, was killed the day before we came from London. And Miss Bertha's given me some lily bulbs for my garden!"
Christina's eyes shone.
"I wish Nurse would let me garden in winter. She says it's too cold. And oh, Miss Bertha, do you like Joan of Arc?"
The little maid's brain was too full of her heroine to forget her. For the next half-hour the old lady and the children talked of the past, with its superstitions and heroism, and then dark settled down, and Nurse came in, and Christina's friends departed. She watched them wistfully from the window, then she ate her tea, feeling a sense of importance and superiority over her boy friend.
"I'm not going to be alone any more. I shall have a father and mother too, and Dawn won't have so much as me!"
She was full of curiosity over the expected arrivals, but Nurse could give her very little information. When she was in bed, she lay awake picturing her new mother.