‘Right O,’ murmured Sally, shattered, all Jocelyn’s teaching vanishing from her mind.
‘Nor,’ remarked Mrs. Luke, gently and very clearly, ‘should I say, “Right O”.’
‘I’ve told her not to a hundred times,’ said Jocelyn, wiping Sally’s frock with his handkerchief.
‘That’s right,’ murmured Sally, who had now lost her head, and only wanted to admit her evil-doing and be forgiven.
‘Nor, dear Salvatia,’ said Mrs. Luke, still more gently and clearly, ‘should I, I think, say that.’
So then Sally said nothing, for there seemed nothing left to say.
‘She’ll be perfectly all right ultimately,’ said Mrs. Luke, coming down to Jocelyn when presently she had taken her upstairs, and tucked her up on the bed, and told her she was tired and must rest. ‘Perfectly.’
Jocelyn was waiting in the sitting-room. He and his mother were now, having got Sally out of the way, going to have their talk.
‘You’re wonderful, Mother,’ he said.
‘Darling Jocelyn,’ smiled his mother. ‘It’s that child who is wonderful,’ she added. ‘Or will be, when she has been properly——’ she was going to say scraped, the word gutter coming once more into her mind, but of course she didn’t, and substituted something milder. ‘When she has been properly trained,’ finished Mrs. Luke.