When the tea-bell rang Dorothy picked Jennie up from the salt mine in which she had taken refuge for an hour.
“Let’s ask if we may have waspberry jam for tea, Phyl,” she said, tucking her heroine under her arm.
But Phyl’s eyes still held the fire and glory of the struggle.
“I’ll tell you,” she said; “let’s leave them here on this mountain till bedtime—they never get any real adventures; Grace and Joan didn’t go in and sit by the nursery fire as soon as the tea-bell went.”
“O-oh,” said Dolly, clasping her dear one jealously. [24] ]It was all very well to have adventures when they themselves were actually on the spot to see no real harm befell, but it seemed a horrible thing to go and leave them unprotected, out-of-doors at night. “O-oh, Phyl,—I wouldn’t like to leave Jennie where I couldn’t see her.”
“Grace’s and Joan’s mothers couldn’t see them,” Phyl said darkly.
“It might be wet,” said Dorothy, with an anxious look at the sky.
“No; it’s beautifully fine,” said Phyl; “at any rate Joan is going to stay and brave it; p’raps Grace hasn’t got enough pluck, though.”
“Gwace is a lot bwaver than Joan,” protested Dolly, quickly fired. She sprang across to the stones and laid her down recklessly. Phyl placed Joan in an equally exposed position, and then with determined faces but anxious hearts they ran in to tea, and left the heroines to struggle on across Russia in the dark.
When bedtime came Dolly was ready to slip out and bring them in after the long three hours.