The other two made the same promise, and Ethel hurried back to the house, for Mrs. Coote’s sharp voice was calling her in impatient tones.
“You’ll have to learn to be quicker in your movements,” she said as the little girl reached her side. “Come right upstairs now, and I’ll show you how to make the beds properly and put the room to rights.”
“Yes, ma’am,” replied Ethel meekly, and at once set to work, doing her best to follow directions.
“Now notice and remember exactly how I want you to do everything, so that after this you can do it all without instruction or help,” said Mrs. Coote, adding: “you’re none too young to learn to make yourself useful, and just as like as not you’ll have to earn your own living all your days.”
“Yes, ma’am, I mean to learn all I can,” returned the little girl meekly, then sighed to herself: “Oh, if we could find our dear, kind grandma and grandpa, they would take care of us all, and have me learning lessons, ’stead of doing house-work while I’m such a little girl.”
Mrs. Coote was very neat and particular and required everything done exactly in what she deemed the best manner, but when all was finished—the floor carefully swept, the beds made, the furniture dusted, she spoke a few words of praise which sounded very pleasant in Ethel’s ears.
“Now,” she added, “you can go out and play with the others. I approve of play for children when work’s done, for—as the saying is—‘all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.’ I don’t mean to be hard on you or the younger ones, and we won’t begin lessons till next week.”
“Thank you, ma’am; you’re very kind, and I’ll try not to give you any trouble,” returned Ethel gratefully. “I think I can make the bed and tidy the room by myself another time.”
“I daresay, for you seem a bright, capable child,” was the not ungracious rejoinder.
The ice of Mrs. Coote’s manner seemed to be thawing under the influence of Ethel’s patient efforts to please and to make herself useful.