“’Tother day I did kick his ball for ’e, and ...” with a dramatic gesture towards the shrinking Teddy, “’e did run into his house to tell his Mammy.”
The look that Miss Margaret gave Tommy showed him that his position was in no wise strengthened. He fell behind and walked home dejectedly to tea.
At half-past six that evening, when the water was high, there was to be a launch, Tregennis said. Miss Dorothea was tired, so Miss Margaret went alone to see the new lugger take the water. She missed the launch because it was all over half-an-hour before she got there, but she found instead, playing on the quay, Mary Sarah and Katie, and the whole Stevenson family.
Of course the Stevensons were there, Mary Sarah explained, for they were the O’Grady’s cousins. Mary Sarah was as much as five, and in virtue of her age she took the lead. Mary Sarah enlightened the others as to the identity of the Lady, and vouched for her respectability, so to speak. The Lady had often spoken to her, she told them with an air of superiority, and she had often spoken to the Lady when the Lady was sittin’ writin’ up on the top o’ the cliffs.
When the conversation dragged a reference was made to sweets, and the whole party repaired to Mrs. Tregennis’s house.
“Mrs. Tregennis,” called out Miss Margaret, “here’s Mary Sarah O’Grady, and Katie O’Grady, and their cousins the Stevensons and me. We’ve all come here for sweets. Have you any to give away?”
There was a blank moment when Mrs. Tregennis announced that she hadn’t got no not one.
Tommy, who was in the kitchen at the time, was delighted to think that sweets were not forthcoming for Mary Sarah and Katie, and the whole family of Stevensons.
Then Miss Margaret brightened up. “I remember!” she said, and ran upstairs two steps at a time.
When she returned she had in her hand a good-sized paper bag which she gave to Mary Sarah.