"Aren't you ever coming to see us?" she said, giving Gertrude a great hug. "Mama is positively offended, and as for papa—disconsolate is not the word."
"You must make them understand how really difficult it is for any of us to come," answered Gertrude, who had a natural dislike to entering on explanations in which such sordid matters as shabby clothes and the comparative dearness of railway tickets would have had to figure largely. "But we are coming one day, of course."
"I'll tell you what it is," cried Fred, as they emerged into the street, and stood looking round for a hansom; "Gertrude may be the cleverest, and Phyllis the prettiest, but Lucy is far and away the nicest of the Lorimer girls."
"Gerty is worth ten of her, I think," answered Conny, crossly. She was absorbed in furtive contemplation of a light that glimmered in a window above the auctioneer's shop opposite.
As the girls were sitting at supper, later on, they were startled by the renewal of those sounds below which had disturbed them in the afternoon.
They waited a few minutes, attentive; but this time, instead of dying away, the noise rapidly gathered volume, and in addition to the scuffling, their ears were assailed by the sound of shrill cries, and what appeared to be a perfect volley of objurgations. Evidently a contest was going on in which other weapons than vocal or verbal ones were employed, for the floor and windows of the little sitting-room shook and rattled in a most alarming manner.
Suddenly, to the general horror, Fanny burst into tears.
"Girls," she cried, rushing wildly to the window, "you may say what you like; but I am not going to stay and see us all murdered without lifting a hand. Help! Murder!" she shrieked, leaning half her body over the window-sill.
"For goodness' sake, Fanny, stop that!" cried Lucy, in dismay, trying to draw her back into the room. But her protest was drowned by a series of ear-piercing yells issuing from the room below.
"I will go and see what is the matter," said Gertrude, pale herself to the lips; for the whole thing was sufficiently blood-curdling.