"She is ten years old," Dora remarked. "I am only eight. I expect she will be ever so tall."
"She's sure to bully you," George assured his sister; "she'll look down on you as a kid, see if she doesn't!"
"My dear George," his mother interposed, "what nonsense you talk! I have no doubt Stella will be a shy, timid little girl; and I shall expect you all to be very considerate and kind to her, and treat her gently. I am afraid your boisterous ways may alarm her. And remember, she has just lost her mother. I fear she will be very sad and sorrowful!"
The four young faces at the window looked sympathetic, and the merry voices were hushed for a while.
"I shall be glad when father is home again," David said at length. "It is so dull when he's away. Mr. Gray will be glad too; he has not had a minute to call his own this last week."
"Oh, Stella's room does look pretty!" Dora broke in. "I helped Miss Clarke arrange it this morning, and we put a bunch of chrysanthemums on the little table in front of the window, and—"
"Dora kept on going in and altering first one thing and then another," George interposed; "I believe she'd be there now if Miss Clarke had not forbidden her to touch anything again."
"Dora is naturally anxious her cousin's first impressions should be pleasant ones," Mrs. Knight said with a smile; "but listen, children, surely I hear the wheels of the dogcart!"
"Yes! yes! They're coming! They're coming!"
The children flew downstairs, whilst the mother waited patiently, a little flush of excitement on her usually pale face, a look of glad expectancy in her eyes. Presently her husband entered the room, and in a minute his arms were around her, and his tender voice asking how she was.