The next morning Aunt Em appeared in Gloria's room before that leisurely young person had decided to get up. She was lying in one of the pleasant intervals between dozes, drowsily conscious that the sunshine was streaming across her feet in a warm flood, and that somewhere children were playing.
'“Lazy girl!” cried Aunt Em in the door. The lazy girl turned without surprise. She was used to early visits. “Perhaps you might like to know the time of day—”
“Oh, say it's 'most bedtime, auntie, then I won't have to get up at all!”
“Nine o'clock!”
Gloria laughed. “Call that late! Why, it might be ten, eleven, twelve! Besides, I had to make up for my nightmares—auntie, I spent nearly all night walking up Treeless Street. I couldn't get out; I thought I'd got to stay there always. The little ragamuffins wouldn't any of them tell me the way out, not even Dinney. I wouldn't have believed it of Dinney!” Aunt Em's face smiled down at the girl among the tumbled pillows. “Poor dear! You have so many troubles!” Aunt Em sympathized in gentle irony.
Gloria sat up straight. “You're making fun! Well, I don't suppose I can complain. It isn't to be wondered at that you can't believe I'd be troubled at other folks' troubles. Honest, auntie, I never was till yesterday on that street!”
“Aren't you ever going to talk about anything else, Rosy-Posie?”
“Don't say 'Rosy,' or you'll set me off again! I won't mention it again to-day if you'll promise to go down there with me some day, Aunt Em. If you won't, I shall go with the District Nurse. I'm going into one of those houses and see if it feels as bad as it looks.”
“You can't go very soon, my dear, for we are going out West with Uncle Walter to-night.”
“Auntie!—honest?” Gloria was on her feet in a sudden access of energy. Drowsiness and laziness were past things. The trips that she and Aunt Em took occasionally with her guardian were her delight; it was always an occasion of gratitude when a “case” called him away during the long summer vacation.