But Phyl’s eyes were full of exultation
, and drew her sister away from Weenie, who tried thirstily to hear the whisper.
“Let’s let it be a really truly adventure this time,” she said; “let’s let them go on struggling there till morning.”
Dolly’s heart swelled.
[25]
]“They’d get dreadful colds, Phyl,” she pleaded, “and Jennie’s only just getting over her menumia.”
“Oh!” said Phyl impatiently, “heroines can’t think about colds and things,—I’ve decided to let Joan stay,—your cowardly little Grace Darling can come to bed if she likes.”
Of course she did not like, and the result was both small maidens crept unhappily into bed, and after long and wistful gazing at the window dropped off at last into troubled sleep.
But who could wake and find it snowing,—an undreamed-of thing that fine night,—and still leave two unfortunate heroines making their harrowing way across the Steppes? There was no thought of Grace in Dolly’s mind and none of Joan in Phyl’s in that midnight hour; it was little Jennie and Suey who lay beneath the bitter sky, and their instantaneous rescue had to be effected at all costs.
But who could marvel that, even despite the cod-liver oil, Phyllida
awoke with laboured breathing, and even strong, rosy Dolly sneezed and sneezed as she slipped on her clothes in the morning to run and tell her mother the sorrowful news that Phyl’s Old Man of the Sea was sitting on her chest?