“Magnanimous soul! Now, Isabelle. I—I dread to glance your way.”
“Why? I thought that Roland was going to tell us the rest of the planning. You are a great monopolist, Bonny.”
“I am silent; I say no more.”
“Well, Roland? What is my share?”
“You are to be housekeeper. To stay with mother and take the home-work from her hands.”
There was a moment of really anxious waiting. “Bonny has always been the house-worker,” said the elder girl, at length. “Why should she not continue and let me go as secretary to Mr. Brook? I took a course of typewriting before she did, if you’ll remember. I don’t like housework, and I shall make a botch of it. I shall worry mother more than help her.”
“I wish I could do both!” cried Beatrice, with her impulsive generosity. “And I can, some of it. You hate dish-washing the worst of any part. Well, leave the dishes till I get home at night and I will do them then. So you can get more time for your painting.”
Mrs. Beckwith said nothing. She waited to let the two settle the matter between themselves if they could; but she was quite ready with the decisive word should it need to be spoken.
“No; we must be more fair than that. If you do the housework I must do the writing; or vice versa. I do not see what difference it makes, why he should mind the change; and you keep mother in better spirits than I do.”
Bonny opened her lips, blushed, and said nothing. Yet Roland came to her aid very promptly. He loved both of his sisters better than many lads would have been willing to confess, but Bonny was his other self. Though they were always bandying jests with each other, they had never had a really angry word. Isabelle, while being far more ladylike and quiet, was also much more selfish; and Roland had suffered from this fault of hers more than once. He was not sorry, therefore, to be able to defend his favorite and discipline Belle at the same time. “I’ll tell you what difference it makes. Mr. Brook loves Bonny best. Yes, he has told me that he really loves her. They have a community of tastes. You know she was always fond of studying natural history when she had a chance, and when people are en rapport it makes everything else easy. With you it would be a real task for him to dictate and direct. It would be just as hard for you. But with Bonny it will seem almost like play,—to him, at least. I only hope he won’t keep my sister too long at her work. He may forget that she is not as enthusiastic as himself.”