Billy laughed again ruefully.
“O dear! You sound just like Bertram,” she pouted. “He didn't want Tommy, either, nor any of the rest of them.”
“The rest of them!”
“Well, I could have had a lot more, you know, the Strata is so big, especially now that Cyril has gone, and left all those empty rooms. I got real enthusiastic, but Bertram didn't. He just laughed and said 'nonsense!' until he found I was really in earnest; then he—well, he said 'nonsense,' then, too—only he didn't laugh,” finished Billy, with a sigh.
Aunt Hannah regarded her with fond, though slightly exasperated eyes.
“Billy, you are, indeed, a most extraordinary young woman—at times. Surely, with you, a body never knows what to expect—except the unexpected.”
“Why, Aunt Hannah!—and from you, too!” reproached Billy, mischievously; but Aunt Hannah had yet more to say.
“Of course Bertram thought it was nonsense. The idea of you, a bride, filling up your house with—with people like that! Tommy Dunn, indeed!”
“Oh, Bertram said he liked Tommy all right,” sighed Billy; “but he said that that didn't mean he wanted him for three meals a day. One would think poor Tommy was a breakfast food! So that is when I thought of keeping up this house, you see, and that's why I want you here—to take charge of it. And you'll do that—for me, won't you?”
Aunt Hannah fell back in her chair.