“Oh, yes, you do. Your meaning is as clear as clear limping water. Please don’t be any more definite or I may burst into tears; and it’s in every etiquette book that I ever read, that it isn’t proper to make the company cry.”
“Yes, that’s the way,” said Betsy with satisfaction. “Just chatter to her like that, and she’ll—”
“Betsy! Cruel one! How can I impress you!”
“Now listen,”—they were drawing near the house—“Mrs. Bruce’ll act sick when you go in. I don’t mean she’s actin’, but she don’t like things to go the way she hasn’t planned ’em; and she’s a real dependent little lady, and you and Mr. Irving must keep her as happy as a lark while I’m gone. I’ve got to get off early in the mornin’, and I may not get a chance to see him alone at all; so you tell him I’m real sorry, and I’ll hurry back, and you take her with you everywhere, and look out for her and—and I’m goin’ around this back way. She’s right in the livin’-room. You’ll find her.”
Betsy disappeared with guilty haste, and Robert, smiling to himself and whistling softly, mounted the steps.
“Once there was a book,” he thought, “named ‘Pink and White Tyranny.’ Madama’s an anachronism. She belongs in it.”
He presented himself cap in hand at the door of the room where Mrs. Bruce lay motionless on a thickly pillowed divan.
“Any admittance?” he asked.
The sufferer stirred. “Is that you, Nixie?” she returned faintly.
He advanced to the divan. “Dear me, what’s this? You were so fit this morning.”