"Two big boys and their mother; I guess not," said Bob succinctly. "The one we saw across the dumb waiter looked a good sort, and full of fun. I got home to-day earlier, mother. Mr. Felton told me that if you would agree to letting me come for all day he would make it worth our while."
"I am glad to hear that, Bob; it shows that he likes you. But I will never consent to giving you up for all day to earning, leaving no time for your studies, until we are absolutely driven to it. As long as I can earn enough to support us all—with strict economy, to be sure, but enough—I will not let my only son lose his chance for an education. Half a day is all that I will let you spend at the office, dear Bob. But thank Mr. Felton for me; tell him I am glad indeed that he thinks you worth having all day. Now, I must get ready for dinner. I hope it is very good and abundant, lassies, for I am pitiably hungry." Mrs. Scollard rose as she spoke, and pulled aside the sliding-door at the end of the room. It led into her own chamber, lighted by the glass in this door, the second room of the series of seven, arranged, as Happie had discovered, in true patty-pan order.
The girls ran through to the kitchen to serve the dinner, while Penny and Dorée lingered with the mother, waiting for the special petting to which, as the baby, Penny was entitled.
"I always think of how the girls in Little Women got ready for their mother to come home, don't you? When we are waiting for our marmee, I mean," said Happie, arranging her little cakes on the delicate Limoges plate. "They swept up the hearth and put their mother's slippers down to warm. I don't think flats are really homes; you can't do that kind of comfy, homey things in a flat."
"But our mother can come home just as truly, and that is the only important thing. We are fortunate to have a home," said Margery, with a suggestion of reproach in her voice.
"Mercy! Don't I know it," retorted Happie. "But won't you be glad when we are able to make a home for mother instead of her making one for us?"
"Next winter I shall do something towards it," said Margery in a tone of quiet conviction. "You will be old enough to keep house then without my help."
"I'd rather be the one to go out; I'm better fitted for it," said Happie. "Dinner is served, Mrs. Scollard, mum," she added, putting her head out of the dining-room door, and calling down the three-foot hall which carried sound like a tunnel.
Mrs. Scollard did not prove her own assertion as to her appetite. The children, anxiously watching her, saw her taste her food, and push it away uneaten, telegraphing their uneasiness to one another as she did so.
"You said you were hungry, dear Deceiver," Happie reproached her at last.