“We’ll stay as long as you’ll let us, Mumsey.”
Mrs. Halford smiled.
Shoes and stockings came off in a jiffy and the children ran out jumping up and down gleefully. They splashed about in the little puddles in the old brick walk, and dabbled their bare toes in the wet grass. They danced and squealed, catching the splashing drops in their hands and flinging them in each other’s faces until the water was dripping in streams from noses and chins.
“Isn’t it grand?”
“My, I never had so much fun in my life!”
They frisked and splashed till the novelty began to wear off a little, then adopted Mrs. Halford’s suggestion about going back to their gooseberry playhouse.
The rain was coming down harder now and the roll of thunder and play of lightning were more frequent. But the little girls were too much absorbed with their own plans to notice this.
“I shall not take Minnie out in this rain—she would be sure to take a nasty cold,” said Gertie decidedly, heartlessly denying her child the pleasures she was enjoying.
“Let’s leave the dolls in the house—they’ll get all messy—besides the paint comes off if you get them a teeny bit wet.”