“Well, ma’am,” replied Nurse, “Miss Ruth’s better; but she’s not, so to say, as cheerful as I could wish. Still a few fancies, ma’am,” she added in an undertone which Ruth heard perfectly.
“Fancies, eh?” repeated Aunt Clarkson in her most cheerful voice. “Oh, we shall get rid of them at Summerford. You’ll have real things to play with there, Ruth, you know. Lucy, and Cissie, and Bobbie will be better than fancies, won’t they?”
Ruth gave a faint little nod. She did not know what her aunt meant by “fancies.” The cat was quite as real as Lucy, or Cissie, or Bobbie. Should she ask her about it, or did she hate cats like Nurse Smith? She gazed wistfully at Mrs Clarkson’s face, who had now drawn a list from her pocket, and was running through the details half aloud with an absorbed frown.
“I shall wait and see the doctor, Nurse,” she said presently; “and if he comes soon I shall just get through my business, and catch the three o’clock express.”
No, it would be of no use, Ruth concluded, as she let her head fall languidly back against the pillow—Aunt Clarkson was far too busy to think about the cat.
Fortunately for her business, the doctor did not keep her waiting long. Ruth was better, he said, and all she wanted now was cheering up a little—she looked dull and moped. “If she could have a little friend, now, to see her, or a cheerful companion,” glancing at Nurse Smith, “it would have a good effect.”
He withdrew with Mrs Clarkson to the door, and they continued the conversation in low tones, so that only scraps of it reached Ruth:
”—Excitable—fanciful—too much alone—children of her own age—”
Aunt Clarkson’s last remark came loud and clear:
“We shall cure that at Summerford, Dr Short. We’re not dull people there, and we’ve no time for fancies.”