“Oh, all you care for is writing, or daubing, or singing, or spouting plays!” began Gladys, wrathfully; but little Genevieve, whom they called Viva, interrupted her: “I wish she wasn’t so big. Are you certain sure, papa, she’s as old as Gwen and Gladys? Because there doesn’t be any one to play with me in this house.”
“She is fourteen,” said Mr. Graham. “And, Gwen and Gladys, I wish you to remember that this Janet Howe is your own cousin, my sister’s child, and I want you to treat her kindly and make her happy. Many’s the scrape her mother got me out of when I was a boy at home. There never was a better sister than Jennie; no boy could have dreamed an improvement on her. I always preferred her as a companion to my brothers; she could row, fish, and bait her own hook and take off her fish when she had caught them, too!—and she was as sweet-tempered and loving as the day was long. I often wish you children were the friends Jen and I used to be! But you each go your own way, and neither cares a pin for any one else’s interests. Perhaps it is the result of living in New York instead of in the peaceful town where I was born.”
The children rarely had heard any reference to their father’s early days, and they listened to this outburst with an interest that made them forget their grievance for a moment. Then Jack spoke: “Do you suppose that this girl is as nice as her mother, papa?” he said. “Do you suppose she can bait a hook and sail a boat?”
“Those things are not always inherited,” his father answered, laughing. “There is not much chance to fish or sail in the middle of a prairie, and Crescendo is a prairie town. But I have no doubt that your cousin Janet will be as nice a little girl as you could find anywhere. I can’t conceive of Jennie having any other than a nice daughter, and I am sure you will be very grateful to me for getting her here.”
“I shan’t be,” said Gladys, decidedly. “I can’t possibly go about with a Wild West Show, papa.”
“Gladys,” said her father, in a tone his children rarely heard. “You forget to whom you are speaking, and that you are speaking of my dearest sister’s daughter. Let me hear one more syllable like that, or see one glimmer of that spirit toward your cousin Janet, and you will be sent to a boarding-school, where you will not go about with any one. I shall invite whom I please to my own house, and my daughters will treat them with courtesy. Remember what I say, and you, too, Gwendoline, Sydney, Jack, and Viva.”
Gwen laughed good-naturedly. “I won’t treat her badly, papa, though you can’t expect me to be precisely glad she is coming,” she said.
Gladys looked sullen, but Jerry saved the day by stretching her arms very wide, a piece of bread in one hand, her dripping teaspoon in the other. “I will love her,” she announced, speaking for the first time; she had been turning from one to the other during this exciting conversation. “I will div her my o’meal po’dge, out of er spoon wight side up. An’ I’ll let Tsusan ’tand ahind her tchair,” added the small hypocrite, nodding her golden curls benignly, and turning to smile beatifically at her nurse-maid.
It was impossible not to laugh at this noble exhibition of generosity, and with this laugh the breakfast party broke up.
“It is really very trying, Howard, to have a girl, of whom we know nothing, and just the age of our girls, thrust upon our poor dears for the entire winter, not to mention my part of the burden,” said Mrs. Graham, as she followed her husband into the hall. “I really can not blame poor Gwen and Gladys for feeling as they do. I should have said more myself, but that I did not care to discuss family matters before the servants, or encourage the children in their apprehensions, and their tendency to disobey you.”