"I was taking a little walk," Ken said. "Here, curl up in bed--you're frozen. No, I'm not going away again--never any more, ducky. It was nice in the garden," he added.
"The garden?" Kirk repeated, still clinging to him. "But you smell of--of--oh, rope, and sawdust, and--and, Ken, your face is wet!"
Mrs. Sturgis protested bitterly against going away. She felt quite able to stay at home. To be sure, she couldn't sleep at all, and her head ached all the time, and she couldn't help crying over almost everything--but it was impossible that she should leave the children. In spite of her half-hysterical protests, the next week saw her ready to depart for Hilltop with Miss McClough, who was to take the journey with her.
"You needn't worry a scrap," laughed Felicia, quite convincingly, at the taxi door. "We've seen Mr. Dodge, and there'll be money enough. You just get well as quick as ever you can."
"Good-by, my darlings," faltered poor Mrs. Sturgis, quite ready to collapse again. "Good-by, Kirk--my precious, precious baby! How can I!"
And the taxicab moved away, giving them just one glimpse of their mother with her poor head on Miss McClough's capable shoulder.
"Well," Ken remarked, "here we are."
And there was really nothing more to be said on the subject.
Such a strange house! Maggie and Norah gone; Felicia cooking queer meals--principally poached eggs--in the kitchen; Miss Bolton failing to appear every morning at ten o'clock as she had done for the last three years; Mother gone, and not even a letter from her--nothing but a type-written report from the physician at Hilltop.