"How are you going to set about it, Mol?"
"Like they do in books. Oh, Nell," Molly's romantic soul lent enthusiasm to her tone, "you know they always do! However hard and grim and horrid she is, the niece, or whoever comes and stays with her, gradually twines herself round her heart—"
"She must be an acrobat, then," put in Nell, sotto voce.
"And alters her whole nature. You see, I'll be awfully sweet and nice—I'll do things for her. They always pick up her handkerchief and fetch her spectacles and put down her shoes to warm when she's coming in with wet feet, and things like that. You needn't laugh, Nell! It's something to do—I'll try awfully hard. I think," Molly's pretty voice trembled, "I think mother would like it."
Nell jumped up.
"All right, only don't go and put your great, noodlish heart into it, Mol! For she's not the right material, old girl!"
"I like her awfully grim and hard at first," enthusiastically. "It's a pity I'm quite so frightened of her, though. I just can't help it—she makes me shiver in my shoes!"
"Nell," from a dim corner came Sheila Pat's voice, and a squeak as she moved.
"Where are you, Atom? Yes?"
"Nell," in very judicial tones, "is it very rude to ask a person not to talk goody?"