Like magic the thunder-cloud departed from Polly’s face. The tears dried in her bright eyes, and the curtain no longer enveloped her slight, young figure.
“Why, of course,” she said. “The strangers, how could I have forgotten! How curious we were about them. We didn’t know their names. Nothing, nothing at all—except that there were two, and that they were coming from Australia. I always thought of them as Paul and Virginia. Dear, dear, dear, I shall have more housekeeping than ever on my shoulders with them about the place.”
“They were coming in October,” said Helen, quietly. “Everything was arranged, although so little was known. They were coming in a sailing vessel, and the voyage was to be a long one, and mother, herself, was going to meet them. Mother often said that they would arrive about the second week in October.”
“In three weeks from now?” said Polly, “We are well on in September, now. I can’t imagine how we came to forget Paul and Virginia. Why, of course, poor children, they must be quite anxious to get to us. I wonder if I’d be a good person to go and meet them. You are so shy with strangers, you know, Nell, and I’m not. Mother used to say I didn’t know what mauvaise honte meant. I don’t say that I like meeting them, poor things, but I’ll do it, if it’s necessary. Still, Helen, I cannot make out what special plan there is in the strangers coming. Nor what it has to do with father, with that horrid piece of news you told me a few minutes ago.”
“It has a good deal to say to it, if you will only listen,” said Helen. “I have discovered by mother’s letters that the father of the strangers is to pay to our father £400 a year as long as his children live here. They were to be taught, and everything done for them, and the strangers’ father was to send over a check for £100 for them every quarter. Now, Polly, listen. Our father is not poor, but neither is he rich, and if—if what we fear is going to happen, he won’t earn nearly so much money in his profession. So it seems a great pity he should lose this chance of earning £400 a year.”
“But nobody wants him to lose it,” said Polly. “Paul and Virginia will be here in three weeks, and then the pay will begin. £400 a year—let me see, that’s just about eight pounds a week, that’s what father says he spends on the house, that’s a lot to spend, I could do it for much less. But no matter. What are you puckering your brows for, Helen? Of course the strangers are coming.”
“Father said they were not to come,” replied Helen. “He told me so some weeks ago. When they get to the docks he himself is going to meet them, and he will take them to another home which he has been inquiring about. He says that we can’t have them here now.”
“But we must have them here,” said Polly. “What nonsense! We must both of us speak to our father at once.”
“I have been thinking it over,” said Helen, in her gentle voice, “and I do really feel that it is a pity to lose this chance of helping father and lightening his cares. You see, Polly, it depends on us. Father would do it if he could trust us, you and me, I mean.”
“Well, so he can trust us,” replied Polly, glibly. “Everything will be all right. There’s no occasion to make a fuss, or to be frightened. We have got to be firm, and rather old for our years, and if either of us puts down her foot she has got to keep it down.”