“Oh, he's perfectly sweet,” suddenly said Helen.
The dog paused for a moment from his ablutions, raised his eyes, and regarded her with a look of cold contempt, then returned to his task.
“Don't be so silly,” said Jeremy. “You know you always hate it when Aunt Amy says things like that about you.”
“Did Nurse see?” asked Mary.
“No, she didn't,” said Jeremy; “but she'll be up in a minute.”
“What are you going to do?” asked Mary her mouth wide open.
“Do? Keep him, of course,” said Jeremy stoutly; at the same time his heart a little failed him as he saw the pool of the water slowly spreading and embracing one cockatoo after another in its ruinous flood.
“We ought to wipe him with a towel,” said Jeremy; “if we could get him dry before Nurse comes up she mightn't say so much.”
But alas, it was too late for any towel; the door opened, and the Jampot entered, humming a hymn, very cheerful and rosy from the kitchen fire and an abundant series of chronicles of human failings and misfortunes. The hymn ceased abruptly. She stayed there where she was, “frozen into an image,” as she afterwards described it. She also said: “You could 'ave knocked me down with a feather.”
The dog did not look at her, but crocked under him the leg that had been stiff like a ramrod and spread out another. The children did not speak.