The silence, and the solemnity, were very oppressive.
"We look all right," said Carol belligerently.
No one answered.
"I'm sure Aunt Grace is as sweet as anybody could be," she added presently.
Dreary silence!
"Don't we love her better than anybody on earth,—except ourselves?"
Then, when the silence continued, her courage waned. "Oh, girls," she whimpered, "isn't it awful? It's the beginning of the end of everything. Outsiders have to come in now to take care of us, and Prudence'll get married, and then Fairy will, and maybe us twins,—I mean, we twins. And then there'll only be father and Connie left, and Miss Greet, or some one, will get ahead of father after all,—and Connie'll have to live with a step-mother, and—it'll never seem like home any more, and—"
Connie burst into loud and mournful wails.
"You're very silly, Carol," Fairy said sternly. "Very silly, indeed. I don't see much chance of any of us getting married very soon. And Prudence will be here nearly a year yet. And—Aunt Grace is as sweet and dear a woman as ever lived—mother's own sister—and she loves us dearly and—"
"Yes," agreed Lark, "but it's not like having Prudence at the head of things."