“I don’t like London any more.”
“I’m going to take you away from London, my precious ducky, truly I am.”
“Back to Squires?” sobbed Cecil.
“I don’t know. Don’t cry, lovey. Don’t you feel well?”
She kissed and petted him with vehement affection and secret anxiety at his unwonted fretfulness.
Long after he had fallen asleep, Rose lay wide awake, revolving in her own mind Family Herald schemes for taking Cecil abroad and living there with him under her maiden name, while she earned money for them both by some unspecified means that refused persistently to materialize into a concrete probability.
She could not make up her mind to answer Lady Aviolet’s letter next day, and instead of doing so, took Cecil to Madame Tussaud’s Wax Works.
The little boy was wildly excited, and Rose, herself childishly delighted at his pleasure, let him remain there until it was almost closing time.
“We shall be late for supper, Ces. I hope we get a ’bus quickly.”
Mrs. Smith’s training had not led Rose to look lightly upon the taking of cabs.