“Oh, do you?”
“Yes,” returned Maudie. “Mother is most deeply interested in all our doings. Did you think she wasn’t? How funny of you! Isn’t your mother interested in what you do?”
“Oh yes, of course mine is. But then mine is rather different to yours. Mine is not a public character.”
“Well, I don’t know that our mother is exactly a public character,” said Julia, who was keenly on the watch for a single word which would in any way pour ridicule or contempt upon her mother.
“Oh yes, she is. Father says she’s a philanthropist.”
“Oh, does he? Well, I don’t know I’m sure. Perhaps she is. I know she’s a jolly hard-worked woman, and if she wasn’t as clever as daylight she wouldn’t be able to keep going as she does. As for her being a philanthropist—well, after all, what is a philanthropist?”
“Well, I did ask father, and he explained it, but he didn’t make it very clear. It seems to be a sort of person who goes about doing good.”
“That’s mother all over,” said Maudie.
“Then who mends your stockings?” asked Evelyn Gage.
“Our stockings? Why, mother has never mended our stockings. Sewing is one of the things mother isn’t great on. You couldn’t expect it.”