“If I go she will never know,” thought the child. “Nancy is clever, and now that I have yielded to her she will not fail me. If I go it will never be discovered, and what has happened before will never be discovered; and Aunt Sophy will never have reason to distrust me, for she will never know. Yes,” thought Pauline, “it is the only possible way.”
She saw Penelope coming to meet her. The other girls were still busy with their birthday surprises, but Penelope had just deposited her own small and somewhat shabby present in Verena’s keeping, and was now, as she expressed it, taking the air. When she saw Pauline she ran to meet her.
“I suppose you are feeling yourself monstrous ’portant, and all that sort of thing,” she said.
“No, I am not,” said Pauline.
Penelope gave her a quick glance out of her sharp eyes.
“Does you like me to be nursery or schoolroom child?” she asked.
“Oh, I like you to be just what you are, Pen; and I do beg of you not to worry me just now.”
“You is most ungrateful. I has been spending my teeny bit of money on you. You will know what I has done on your birthday. You are going to get a most ’licious present, and it will be I who has gived it to you. Sometimes I does wish I was two years older; but Aunt Sophy has got monstrous fond of me, Paulie, and of you, too. I know it. Shall I tell you how I know it?”
“How?” asked Pauline.
“I was standing near her when you said you wouldn’t go for a drive, and she gave a big sigh, just as though she was hurted. I was hurted, too, for I thought I might perhaps sit on the little back-seat and hear more’n is good for me. People always say that little girls like me hear more’n is good for them. I love—I love hearing things of that wicked sort. Well, you didn’t go, and I couldn’t have my nice drive on the little back-seat. But Aunt Sophy did give a pained sigh. She loves you, does Aunt Sophy. She loves me, too.”