“Well, Fliss always was a great one to go. I don’t know as I saw much more of her than I do now, when she was living at home. Of course she don’t have much time to come here with her social doings and all.”
They talked for a few minutes and then Ellen took things into her own hands.
“I’ve got to go to the market now,” she said, “if I’m to get anything fresh for dinner. I’ll walk down with you, Mrs. Harrison.”
Cecily rose in spite of Mrs. Horton’s protest.
“I know you’ll beg Ellen away from me. I don’t want to be mean about it, but being as I’m her own cousin, it seems as if I couldn’t get along. If I could get my friend Mrs. Ellis, who’s a widow, I might.”
“Now don’t you fret, Carrie, and get your fever up. No one’s going to leave you. There’s just a few things that Mrs. Harrison and me would like to discuss private.”
She wore her neat blue suit and as they came out of the apartment house together no trace of servility or embarrassment clung to Ellen.
“You see,” she said, “with Mrs. Allenby—Fliss—being at your house so much and all, I thought it was just as well not to tell you we was related. I asked her not to mention it, too.”
“So foolish. I wish she had insisted. But you aren’t the least bit like one another. I never would have guessed.”
“No; there’s no noticeable resemblance. How’s little Leslie, and Dorothea, and the baby?”