“Perhaps you would rather I did not say anything about this either,” she remarked. “I won’t, you know, if you tell me not. I never make mischief. I would not do so for all the world.”
“Well,” said Nan, “I did disobey Mrs. Richmond; but I was in such a hurry because we were all going to the country—we were to have such a lovely, lovely afternoon! I was very sorry afterwards that I did not insist on Susan’s coming with me.”
“We are mostly sorry when we do wrong things,” said Augusta. “I am; but then, you see, I do not get into scrapes. I would not for all the world. I am the sort of girl who gets other girls out of scrapes. I sometimes think that is my mission in life. What a lot of wrong things you have done to-day! Gone out without permission, and been the cause of poor Kitty’s favourite rat’s death. I would not be in your shoes for a good deal—that is, unless I had a girl like me to help me. Now, like a good child, bring me the least objectionable of the books on that shelf.”
“Augusta,” said Nan.
“What a portentously solemn voice! Well? Augusta is listening.”
“I think it is better to say that—that I do not want you to keep secrets for me.”
“Oh! all right, my dear—all right; you can please yourself exactly. I’ll be able to explain just how I saw you with the dog in the room, and the dead rat. Kitty will think you did it on purpose.”
“She could not think such a thing.”
“Well, you must admit that it looks like it; you up there, and the rat dead, and Jack—your Jack—having done it. However, please yourself. We will see when the time comes what you will choose. We will not decide at present. Now then, which is the best of the books?”
“I don’t know. Here is The Fairchild Family.”