Aunt Mary was getting to that period in life when the nearer the relative the greater the dislike, so that when her niece arrived the welcome which awaited her was even less cordial than ever.
“Did you bring a trunk?” she asked.
“A small one,” replied the visitor.
“That’s something to be grateful for,” said the aunt. “If I’d invited you to visit me, of course I’d feel differently about things.”
Arethusa accepted this as she accepted all things, unpacked, saw Lucinda off, assumed charge of the house, and then dragged a rocking chair to her aunt’s bedside and unfolded her sewing. Ere she had threaded her needle Aunt Mary was sound asleep, and so her niece sewed placidly for an hour or more, until, like lightning out of a clear sky:
“Arethusa!”
The owner of the name started—but answered immediately:
“Yes, Aunt Mary.”
“When I die I want to be buried from a roof garden! Don’t you forget! You’d better go an’ write it down. Go now—go this minute!”
Arethusa shook as if with the discharge of a contiguous field battery. She had not had Lucinda’s gradual breaking-in to her aunt’s new trains of thought.