“You’re so, generous, Mother,” sighed Nancy. “I wish I were more like you.”
Her mother smiled and squeezed the young hand that rested so confidently upon her own arm.
“Don’t worry, dear,” she answered. “You know what dear grandma always said when you got into little troubles?”
“Yes,” replied Nancy, “that my heart was in the right place if my head was a little shaky.”
“Yes, that’s it. And don’t we miss grandma? She might just as well come out here with us, but I was afraid of bringing her to the old-fashioned little house. Well, here we are at our hotel,” Mrs. Brandon broke off, as they came in sight of the long white building, with its unmistakable hotel piazza.
In the row of rockers on the porch sat a row of men on one side and almost a row of women, or “ladies” on the other. Country folks, with a few city interlopers, composed the patronage of the Waterfall House, it was quite evident.
Nancy and her mother smiled at the faces and half-greeted them, as they passed into the office, and after asking for Miss Townsend’s rooms, followed the boy along the red carpeted hall, and up a stairs carpeted with what once had been red. They journeyed on until they reached a little turn in the second hall. Before this their guide halted and pointed out a door that bore the number twenty-seven.
Nancy’s heart would have jumped a little apprehensively had it been a less healthy young heart, but as it was, she merely kept very close to her mother until the boy turned on his heel and whistled a returning tune.
“Maybe she’s sick in bed,” Nancy was thinking, just as the door was opened in response to her mother’s knock.
“Why! Mrs. Brandon!” she heard a voice exclaim. “And Nancy!” as Miss Townsend bowed them in. “How glad I am to see you! Do come right in. Here, take this chair, it’s so comfortable. Nancy, sit by the window,” she was pushing a chair over to the girl, “and you can see the people passing. Well, I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you both.”