Sister Dominic held a stout umbrella in one black-cotton-gloved hand, whilst the other one grasped the wrist of the youngest orphan. The other two orphans, obscured in blue serge and hard, dark, straw hat-brims, each held on to a fold of Sister Clara’s habit.
One thing, Reverend Mother had promised that the community should recite the Litany of Loretto after office just as they did to ensure anyone from the convent a safe journey.
So they’d be protected, even scurrying, a row of five, holding on to one another, across the streets, in front of those frightful honking motor-cars, that looked like they’d take the heads off of you, give them a chance.
“This’ll be it, Dominic dear. No. 3.”
A maid in a cap and apron to open the door—and the smartness of her! All grey-and-white, and showing her shape the way a modest convent-bred girl would never have done.
And the waiting-room, with a carpet, and padded chairs, and a fine pot-plant—putting worldly ideas into the orphans’ heads, as likely as not. As for the pictures and books on the table....
“Don’t be casting your eyes about that way, children dear. Sit quiet now. Dominic, the hats’ll have to come off of them, we may be sure of that. We’ll pile them this way, on the chair, and you’ll keep an eye on them, for fear someone else’ll be coming in and perhaps making off with them. It’s not as though we were in a good Catholic country.”
The hats of the orphans were stacked upon a chair, and Sister Dominic sat upon the edge of another chair, facing them. She held her umbrella.
“If he does well by the children, the sisters’ll go to him. The Infirmarian says there’s some of them with teeth in a terrible state.”
Sister Clara’s tongue sought familiar cavities, and her hand went to the particular fold of serge sleeve in which were imbedded two large pins, one of which was taken out at the end of meals, and replaced after use in the exact same place, so as to save making a fresh hole.