"I didn't sit all over it," retorted Van, "and I didn't want to come with you, but you made me."
"Well, because you and Pickering were having such a fight. O me, I wish I'd let you alone," she added, sinking back into her corner.
But Van, much preferring Alexia to Pickering, couldn't say the same, so the carriage rolled on to a gloomy silence within.
"Oh, I say," began Pickering, after this had gone on for some minutes, "this is a sweet way to go to Mr. King's, isn't it?"
"Well, we can't help it," cried Alexia, flying up from her corner; "I'm sure, Pickering, you can't blame any of us. And I haven't got Polly Pepper; you know she was coming in here with me, and everything is just as bad as it can be."
"You're always tagging on to Polly Pepper; I'm glad you haven't got her this time," declared Cathie, in venom from her corner.
"Of course I'm always after Polly," said Alexia, decidedly, "when she's my very dearest friend. O my, don't I wish I could get out!"
"Well, you will pretty soon," said Pickering, coolly; "we'll all get out, for we'll be there in a minute. And then how we'll look, for we're supposed to be helping Mr. King's family, and they're in such trouble."
"O dear me!" exclaimed Alexia, in great distress, whirling around suddenly to look out of the window, her long, fight braids flying over her shoulder. "Pickering Dodge, we aren't near Mr. King's yet," she declared, peering out; "we haven't got to—oh, yes we have—O dear me, what shall we do?" and she flew back again into her corner.
"We've just got to do something," said Pickering, in a determined voice. Little David had been past speaking for some time, and, wedged in between Cathie and Pickering, had been chiefly occupied in twisting his hands, and trying not to think how very dreadful it all was, and how Mamsie would feel to see them all come in.