Mr. Bell opened his mouth to say, "Tell them it's an old house, Nan, and the ceiling 's cracked"--when the thing happened.
The ceiling was old, the house was not too solidly built, and the battle above had reached its height when, quite without warning, down upon the freshly cleaned floor fell a great mass of plaster. The powdery lime rose in a suffocating cloud and covered Jane and her father with dust and debris.
It was a minute more before the combatants, wrestling furiously over the bare floors above, could be made to understand by a horrified young person, who shrieked the news at them from the top of the staircase, the havoc they had wrought.
But when they comprehended what had happened they hurried downstairs.
"Well, of all the----" Ross was too shocked to finish.
"I say, but we've done it now, have n't we?" exclaimed Peter, in disgust. "Janey--dad--it did n't hurt you, did it?"
"Only my pride--and my hair," answered Jane, as she vainly tried to brush her curly locks free from plaster.
"It's a shame! Why didn't you stop us? Clumsy louts! Pulling the place down about our ears the very first night!"
"And how we hurried that paper man, to get him through to-night!" lamented Nancy, brushing off her father with anxious fingers. "We were going to have the dining-room all settled to-morrow----"
"And to-morrow 's a holiday," murmured Jane, from under her hair.