“Quick, quick! give me your foot, Muffie,” she cried.
[p128]
The child wildly stuck out one leg.
And Miss Bibby with her slim white hands seized the shoe—the shoe all black with its fierce, prickly living mass—unlaced it and dragged it off. Her own arms were alive in a moment, but she merely bit her lip and began to pull at the sock.
“What insanity of folly!” cried Hugh Kinross, sweeping her nearly off her feet, “here, where’s the bath-room?”
Pauline dashed on to lead the way, and Hugh ran the two afflicted little girls hurriedly before him with one hand, and Miss Bibby grasped firmly by the shoulder with the other.
Once in the room, he turned on the three taps, hot, cold and shower, all at the same time, and followed this by dropping both children into the water.
“You’d better follow them,” he said, for Miss Bibby was fidgeting about as if afflicted with St. Vitus’s dance in her arms and shoulders. “Is there any ammonia in the house? Never mind, I’ll go across and get some from Kate.”
He strode away and Miss Bibby did not lose a minute in following his advice.
He gave the bottle to Anna on his return, Anna, who had only just come back from the end of the orchard where she had found it necessary to go and ask Blake—leisurely—for [p129] some parsley. She was open-mouthed at what had happened.
“Here’s the armonia, Miss Bibby,” she said, going into the bath-room, “and you’re to—to pollute it with some water and rub it on hard. Here, will I be doing, Miss Lynn?”