'How's John?' began William, rather blank at missing him.
'Much better—so much better, but I told him not to think of seeing you to-night. He has been in bed more than two hours. And oh, my Bobbie, you ought to be there too!'
'Yes, she's tired to death,' said Will; 'we have been going since eight last night.'
She really was too much tired to speak or eat, and passively submitted, scarcely conscious where she was—nay, at some moments thinking herself in the old nursery in St Oswald's Buildings, in the comfort of being undressed, cossetted, and put to bed by the hands most natural to her since infancy. After a time of weariness too great for right sleep, and of a strange confusion about confessions to Wilmet, she at length lost the feverish element of over-fatigue, and slept soundly till she opened her eyes to realise a little festooned bed in an alcove, white curtains over the windows, strange new street-cries outside, and within, her own box, a sofa, a table, a chair, and a fine clock, which could not be going, for it pointed to half-past ten!
As she was sitting up and looking in vain for some means of washing, the door gently opened, and that dear motherly face looked in. 'Awake at last, my poor little tired bird?'
'O Wilmet, is it really so late?'
'Of course! never mind. Willie is just as bad; there are his boots outside his door still. There, drink this coffee before you dress. Yes, you want it; you could take nothing last night. Let me look at you; are you quite rested, and fit to get up?'
'Oh yes!' energetically; 'if only I saw how to wash!'
Wilmet laughed, and opened a cupboard-door, displaying the requisites, even including a tub, which she had found and purchased individually. After the ablutions she could judge of her little sister better, and thought the cheeks not greatly wanting in their roundness, or healthful freshness; but all the brown hair had been cropped, and the short wavy curls added to the childish contour. It was a prim little schoolgirl figure that stood there in a grey carmelite dress, and black silk apron.
'My dear, have not you a bow or bit of ribbon? John likes colour.'