One morning Penelope, or “Penny,” as she was generally called, was sitting in the nursery window-seat with a piece of sewing in her hands, it seemed more tiresome even than usual, for there was no one in the room but nurse, and she appeared too busy for any conversation. Penny had tried several subjects, but had received such short absent answers that she did not feel encouraged to proceed, so there was nothing to beguile the time, and she frowned a good deal and sighed heavily at intervals. At last she looked up in despair.
“What can you be doing, nurse?” she said, “and why are you looking at all those old things of mine and Nancy’s?”
Nurse did not answer. She held out a little shrunken flannel dress at arm’s-length between herself and the light and scanned it critically, then she put it on one side with some other clothes and took up another garment to examine with equal care. Penny repeated her question, and this time nurse heard it.
“I’m just looking out some old clothes for poor Mrs Dicks,” she said.
“Do you mean our Mrs Dicks?” asked Penny. “What does she want clothes for?”
“Well, Miss Penny,” said nurse, proceeding to look through a pile of little stockings, “when a poor woman’s lost her husband, and is left with six children to bring up on nothing, she’s glad of something to clothe them with.”
Penny felt interested. “Our Mrs Dicks” had been her mother’s maid, and after she married the children had often been to visit her, and considered her a great friend. Sometimes they went to tea with her, and once she had given Nancy, Penny’s second sister, a lovely fluffy kitten.
Penny was fond of Mrs Dicks, and it seemed dreadful to think that she must now bring up six children on nothing. She felt, however, that she must inquire into the thing a little more.
“Why must she bring up her six children on nothing?” she asked, letting her work fall into her lap.
“Because,” said nurse shortly, “she hasn’t got any money or anyone to work for her. But if I were you, Miss Penny, I’d get on with my needlework, and not waste time asking so many questions.”