"What did she say?"
"We-ell," Sammy admitted slowly, "she was busy cutting out something on the dining-room table and her mouth was full of pins. I had to ask her two or three times before she seemed to hear me."
"And then what did she say?" insisted Ruth, with suspicion, knowing both Sammy and his mother pretty well.
"Why, she said: 'If you will only go out and stop bothering me for an hour I don't care what you do.' So, ain't that saying I can?" demanded Sammy.
"I should say she had given you carte blanche," chuckled Neale, while the older Corner House girls laughed.
"I think you may go as far as to get the wire, pulleys, and other things needed," Ruth said. "I will ask Sammy's mother myself when she is not so strenuously engaged."
Dot listened to this and gazed after the departing older sister in something like awe.
"What is it, Dottums?" asked Agnes, chucking the little fairy-like child under her soft chin.
"Oh, our Ruth does talk so beautifully," sighed the smallest Corner House girl. "What does 'strain—strain-u-ous-ly' mean, Aggie?"
"Exactly that," laughed her sister. "Mrs. Pinkney certainly was working under a 'strain.' You have hit the meaning of 'strenuously' better even than Mr. Dick."