'Yes,' said the Reverend Mr. Sanders, 'so I suspected from the first.'
And now what did he mean by that, thought Prudence Jane to herself. She could no longer see his face. He had turned abruptly in his chair and was watching something through the aperture in the portières.
Prudence Jane heard the thump of a pair of shoes plodding up the stairs and along the upper hall. She knew that it was Peter Piper going to find Aunt Annie. There was a stir in the room overhead, then the muffled sound of a rocking-chair suddenly abandoned, followed by the swish of skirts coming along the passage and down the stairs.
Prudence Jane sat with parted lips on the edge of the sofa.
The Reverend Mr. Sanders looked decidedly nervous, but he rose and presented a bold front to whatever might be coming to him through those portières. In another moment they were pushed hastily aside, and Aunt Annie, crowned with a quite faultless coiffure, hurried into the room.
'Why, Mr. Sanders,' she said, 'I did not know until this minute that you were here.'
Then her eye fell upon her niece. Prudence Jane was now standing in front of the sofa, tracing the pattern of the carpet with the toe of an ankle-tie.
'Why didn't you tell me that Mr. Sanders was waiting?' demanded Aunt Annie sternly.
Prudence Jane continued to gaze at the carpet.
'Mr. Sanders,' said Aunt Annie, who never postponed a disagreeable duty, 'we have a little girl here who cannot speak the truth, and we are going to ask you to tell us what becomes of people who tell wrong stories.'