“That you, Mrs. Darke?” she called out in her piping old voice. “Come in, me dear, I’m that stiff with me rheumatics to-day I can’t scarce rise out of me chair.”
“It’s not Mrs. Darke,” said Robinette, stooping to enter through the tiny doorway. “It’s a stranger, Mrs. Prettyman, come all the way from America to see you.”
“Lor’ now, Miss, whoever may you be?” the old woman cried, making as if she would 46 rise from her chair. But Robinette caught her arm and made her sit still.
“Don’t get up; please sit right there where you are, and I’ll take this chair beside you. Now, Mrs. Prettyman, look at me hard, and tell me if you know who I am.”
The old woman gazed into Robinette’s face, and then a light seemed to break over her.
“It’s Miss Cynthia’s daughter you are!” she cried. “My Miss Cynthia as went and married in America!”
She caught Robinette’s white ringed hands in hers, and Robinette bent down and kissed the wrinkled old face.
“I know that mother loved you, Nurse,” she said. “She used often, often to tell me about you.”
After the fashion of old people, Mrs. Prettyman was too much moved to speak. Her face worked all over, and then slow tears began to run down her furrowed cheeks. She got up from her chair and walked across the uneven floor, leaning on a stick.