"The step-children are here."
"If you wish, Grandmother. It sounds just as if you said the step-children."
"I did say the step-children. I'm going to send them up for you to amuse them. Go right on upstairs, children. She ain't a bear. She won't bite you."
"I—" pant—pant—"see a bear yesterday, a dancing bear. Didn't I see a bear, Mose?"
"Hush, babe," another breathy voice answered. "You don't want to talk so much when you go a-visiting."
A mysterious single file of chubby children, considerably more ragged than dirty, made a cautious way up the steep stairs, panting as they came. Elizabeth led the way into the big chamber where she had been writing, and the three followed her solemnly. Her first instinct was to give them each a friendly pat, as if they were so many little dogs who had been running hard.
"Good morning, children," she said. She was fond of children, and these were adorable specimens, despite their superfluous fringes.
"Good morning, teacher," they answered, with unexpected promptitude.
"Well, I'm not exactly a teacher, you know. I'm just Miss—I mean—Elizabeth."
"We know who you be," the eldest, a boy, volunteered. "You'm Miss Laury Ann's granddaughty, that's who you be. We come to see you."