“Do you remember what a broiling day Friday was?” interrupted Margaret. “Miss Winter and Norman both told me I ought not to let them go, and I began to think so when they came home. Mary was the colour of a peony!”
“Oh! it would not have signified if the children had been good for anything, but all their mothers were out at work, and, of those that did come, hardly one had learned their lessons—Willy Blake had lost his spelling-card; Anne Harris kicked Susan Pope, and would not say she was sorry; Mary Hale would not know M from N, do all our Mary would; and Jane Taylor, after all the pains I have taken with her, when I asked how the Israelites crossed the Red Sea, seemed never to have heard of them.”
Margaret could have said that Ethel had come in positively crying with vexation, but with no diminution of the spirit of perseverance.
“I am so glad you are come, Richard!” she continued. “You will put a little new life into them. They all looked so pleased when we told them Mr. Richard was coming.”
“I hope we shall get on,” said Richard.
“I want you to judge whether the Popes are civilised enough to be dressed for Sunday-school. Oh, and the money! Here is the account-book—”
“How neatly you have kept it, Ethel.”
“Ah! it was for you, you know. Receipts—see, aren’t you surprised?”
“Four pounds eighteen and eightpence! That is a great deal!”
“The three guineas were Mr. Rivers’s fees, you know; then, Margaret gave us half-a-sovereign, and Mary a shilling, and there was one that we picked up, tumbling about the house, and papa said we might have, and the twopence were little Blanche’s savings. Oh, Ritchie!” as a bright coin appeared on the book.