“I know it. Oh, dear--what can we do?”
Rachel suddenly sat upright.
“Do? Why, we’ll stand it, of course. We just mustn’t mind if he turns the house into a hotel and the yard into a--a pasture!” she said hysterically. “We must just think of Ralph and of his being a doctor. Come, let’s go to the village and see if we can rent that tenement of old Mrs. Goddard’s.”
With a long sigh and a smothered sob, Tabitha went to get her hat.
Mrs. Goddard greeted the sisters effusively, and displayed her bits of rooms and the tiny square of yard with the plainly expressed wish that the place might be their home.
The twins said little, but their eyes were troubled. They left with the promise to think it over and let Mrs. Goddard know.
“I didn’t suppose rooms could be so little,” whispered Tabitha, as they closed the gate behind them.
“We couldn’t grow as much as a sunflower in that yard,” faltered Rachel.
“Well, anyhow, we could have some houseplants!”--Tabitha tried to speak cheerfully.
“Indeed we could!” agreed Rachel, rising promptly to her sister’s height; “and, after all, little rooms are lots cheaper to heat than big ones.” And there the matter ended for the time being.