“What do you mean by we? Just us three, or the Girl Scouts in our group?” asked Helen.
“I don’t know,” said Rosanna dismally. “I really haven’t the first idea! Let’s all think.”
CHAPTER II
Three in a row, they sat and thought while the leaf piles smouldered and the afternoon went by. Plan after plan was offered and discussed and cast aside. At last Elise glanced at her little silver wrist watch, and wound up her scarf.
“Time for maman to come home,” she said. “She likes it when I meet her at the door with my love, and myself likes it too.”
“Of course you do, you dear!” said Helen. “Good-bye! We will keep on thinking and perhaps tomorrow we will be able to get hold of some plan that will be worth acting on. I must go too, Rosanna.”
“I will walk around the block with you,” said Rosanna, rising and calling a gay good-bye after Elise. She went with Helen almost to the door of her apartment and then returned very slowly. How she did long to help Gwenny! There must be some way. Poor patient, uncomplaining Gwenny! Rosanna could not think of her at all without an ache in her heart. She was so thin and her young face had so many, many lines of pain.
She was so thoughtful at dinner time that her Uncle Robert teased her about it. He wanted to know if she had robbed a bank or had decided to run off and get married and so many silly things that his mother told him to leave Rosanna alone. Rosanna smiled and simply went on thinking. After dinner she slipped away and went up to her own sitting-room. Then Uncle Robert commenced to worry in earnest. He had his hat in his hand ready to go over and see Mr. Culver, but he put it down again and went up to Rosanna’s room, three steps at a time.