Marion spoke with some little warmth. However hardly she might think of her own family, she did not like to have any one else speak ill of them.
"Oh, of course, only not quite. But how any one can like such a hole in the woods as this! You don't have any society."
"Oh yes, we have plenty of company; besides that, we make up a tolerably sized society of our own," said Stanley, as if determined not to be vexed.
"Stanley, my dear, have you a shawl on?" called her mother from within.
"I am coming in, mother," answered Stanley. "Will you come, Marie?"
"Marie and I are going to take a little walk together," said Gerty. "I wish you would bring me a hood or something, Stanley."
Stanley brought the hood, and Marion and Gerty walked down toward the gate.
"Well, and how do you get on?" asked Gertrude.
"Very well," said Marion; but she could not repress a little sigh, which Gerty's quick ear caught directly.
"Stanley makes a long stay, doesn't she?" said Gerty. "I don't know which I wonder at most, her mother's blindness or father's."