"All right, then," and added threateningly, "but you'll wish I hadn't."
Then Lark opened the door,—a woeful figure! In one hand she carried an empty shoe box. And her face was streaked with good rich Iowa mud. Her clothes were plastered with it. One shoe was caked from the sole to the very top button, and a great gash in her stocking revealed a generous portion of round white leg.
Poor Prudence! At that moment, she would have exchanged the whole parsonage, bathroom, electric lights and all, for a tiny log cabin in the heart of a great forest where she and Lark might be alone together.
And Fairy laughed. Prudence looked at her with tears in her eyes, and then turned to the wretched girl.
"What have you been doing, Lark?"
The heart-break expressed in the face of Lark would have made the angels weep. Beneath the smudges of mud on her cheeks she was pallid, and try as she would, she could not keep her chin from trembling ominously. Her eyes were fastened on the floor for the most part, but occasionally she raised them hurriedly, appealingly, to her sister's face, and dropped them again. Not for worlds would she have faced the Ladies! Prudence was obliged to repeat her question before Lark could articulate a reply. She gulped painfully a few times,—making meanwhile a desperate effort to hide the gash in one stocking by placing the other across it, rubbing it up and down in great embarrassment, and balancing herself with apparent difficulty. Her voice, when she was able to speak, was barely recognizable.
"We—we—we are making—mud images, Prudence. It—it was awfully messy, I know, but—they say—it is such a good—and useful thing to do. We—we didn't expect—the—the Ladies to see us."
"Mud images!" gasped Prudence, and even Fairy stared incredulously. "Where in the world did you get hold of an idea like that?"
"It—it was in that—that Mother's Home Friend paper you take, Prudence." Prudence blushed guiltily. "It—it was modeling in clay, but—we haven't any clay, and—the mud is very nice, but—Oh, I know I look just—horrible. I—I—Connie pushed me in the—puddle—for fun. I—I was vexed about it, Prudence, honestly. I—I was chasing her, and I fell, and tore my stocking,—and—and—but, Prudence, the papers do say children ought to model, and we didn't think of—getting caught." Another appealing glance into her sister's face, and Lark plunged on, bent on smoothing matters if she could. "Carol is—is just fine at it, really. She—she's making a Venus de Milo, and it's good. But we can't remember whether her arm is off at the elbow or below the shoulder——" An enormous gulp, and by furious blinking Lark managed to crowd back the tears that would slip to the edge of her lashes. "I—I'm very sorry, Prudence."
"Very well, Lark, you may go. I do not really object to your modeling in mud, I am sure. I am sorry you look so disreputable. You must change your shoes and stockings at once, and then you can go on with your modeling. But there must be no more pushing and chasing. I'll see Connie about that to-night. Now——"