Marjorie did hate those tedious "exercises," and she was glad for her mother to see how poky it was to drum at them for an hour. As a rule, Marjorie did her practising patiently enough, but sometimes she revolted, and it made her chuckle to see Mrs. Maynard carefully picking out the "five-finger drills."
"Keep your hands straight, Helen," she admonished her mother. "Keep the backs of them so level that a lead pencil wouldn't roll off. I'll get a lead pencil."
"No, don't!" exclaimed Mrs. Maynard, in dismay. She liked to play the piano, but she was far from careful to hold her hands in the position required by Midget's teacher.
"Yes, I think I'd better, Helen. If you contract bad habits, it's so difficult to break them."
Roguish Marjorie brought a lead pencil, and laid it carefully across the back of her mother's hand, from which it immediately rolled off.
"Now, Helen, you must hold your hand level. Try again, dearie, and if it rolls off, pick it up and put it back in place."
Mrs. Maynard made a wry face, and the other grown-ups laughed, to see the difficulty she experienced with the pencil.
"One—two—three—four," she counted, aloud.
"Count to yourself, Helen," said Marjorie. "It's annoying to hear you do that!"
This, too, was quoted, for Mrs. Maynard had often objected to the monotonous drone of Marjorie's counting aloud.