"Old mammy has an attack of her pet bunion," I said, "and I suppose that the children are, in consequence, debarred from their walk, and they have but just come out. Poor little things! What do you say, Bessie, to taking them with us? They would be enchanted."
"So should I. By all means let us take them," answered Bessie, who had a love for children and their company, only second to my own.
"O, sister Amy!" cried both the little ones, dropping the perambulators, and rushing up to us as soon as their eyes fell upon us, "Mammy's bunion hurts so, she can't take us to walk, and it's such a lovely day, and we want to go Jim's peanut-stand."
And the ever ready tears rushed to the eyes of Allie, who was prone to weep upon slight provocation; and even Daisy, who was more philosophical, though younger, looked heart-broken.
Sunshine speedily succeeded the showers, however, for my proposal that they should accompany us was received with rapture; and, taking their dolls into their arms, they abandoned the perambulators to the care of mammy, who hobbled towards home with them. This bunion was mammy's choice grievance, and she doubtless suffered much from it; but it was an article of the family faith, that, when for any reason she was disinclined to take her walks abroad with the children, the bunion sympathized with this reluctance, and crippled her to an unusual extent.
"And where do you want to go?" I asked of the beaming pair, who were now hanging, the one on Bessie's arm, the other on mine. "Bessie and I do not much care which way we go."
"Oh," said Daisy, ecstatically, "if you would only take us to Jim's peanut-stand! Mother said we might go, and then mammy couldn't take us."
"It's not fash'nable, but it's very respectable, Amy," said Allie, impressively.
"But we cannot go to a peanut-stand, even though it belongs to Jim," I expostulated.
"But it's not in the street; it's—you know Johnny, the flower-man, sister?" said Allie.