‘Oh, Emmeline,’ pleaded Kitty, as Emmeline still hesitated, ‘of course she wouldn’t mind! Why you’re twelve years old—almost grown up.’
That decided Emmeline. She could not bear to lose prestige in the eyes of the little sister who thought her almost grown up. ‘I’m sure Aunt Grace couldn’t mind,’ she said boldly; ‘she knows I’m quite to be trusted to look after the others.’
‘That you are, my darling,’ agreed Mary, rather too easily reassured—as a nurse it had been her one weakness that she never could endure to disappoint the children—‘and Micky and Kitty will be as good as gold, I’m sure’; whereupon the twins assumed the expressions of a pair of youthful saints.
‘May Micky and I look at the picture Bible?’ suggested Kitty meekly. Whenever the twins visited that house—they had often done so in the days when Mary was still their nurse—one of two amusements was the recognised order of the day. Either they played—not the real game, but one of their own invention—with a set of elaborate Indian chessmen brought home by a sailor brother of Mary’s; or else they looked at the pictures of a fascinating old French Bible which had somehow come into the possession of Mary’s grandfather.
‘And now, dearie, tell me all about how you’ve been getting on,’ said Mary, as soon as there was quiet in the room, owing to the twins having become blissfully absorbed in the picture of the plague of frogs in the old French Bible. It always sent delicious thrills through them to discover frogs hopping lightheartedly out of Pharaoh’s very modern looking soup tureen, or creeping out from between his bedclothes.
‘Aunt Grace is kind in her own way,’ acknowledged Emmeline—she was always candid about people’s merits even when she disapproved of them—‘but living with her isn’t like living with you, Mary.’
‘Well, dear, it’s not to be expected it should be, seeing that she’s a young lady, and me only an old nurse,’ said Mary simply; ‘but I’m sure whatever changes there are will work out right in the end, for I know she is fond of you.’
‘Yes, she’s fond of us—that is, she is fond of the twins,’ said Emmeline, ‘but she doesn’t care about the sort of things mother cared about, and you care about. What she really cares for is dressing prettily and going to parties, and so on.’
‘I don’t think, dear, we can judge what’s in other people’s hearts,’ said Mary, slowly. She felt somewhat at a loss how to answer Emmeline, for she was too good and loyal to encourage the child in criticising her aunt, but she herself had been brought up to regard most amusements as dangerous, if not actually sinful, and there was no doubt that Aunt Grace was very gay and merry.