“Lordy, Miss Lou, dat you?”
“Yes, or what’s left of me after tumbling out of the tree.” Walking up to her aunt’s side, then bending over her: “Aunt Thalia, are you sick?”
Mrs. Barry opened her eyes with a look of relief, but before she could speak Ginny Ann broke in:
“Missis almost c’azy, finkin’ you done runned away. You sartinly did gib us a skeer, chile! Ole mis’, she say jes’ now, ‘Run upsta’rs, Ginny Ann, and let dat chile out o’ dat garret. Guess she sorry for her sass now.’ And I went and foun’ dat windy wide open, and you gone. And ole mis’ flew in sech a rage, umph me, as you nebber saw, and mos’ went inter de highstrikes.”
“Ginny Ann, hold your tongue, you old fool!” cried Mrs. Barry, sitting upright, with a suddenness that made her domestics reel backward in dismay. “Is that you, Louise? Where have you been, child, giving us such a scare about you?”
Something like tenderness quivered through her voice despite its acerbity, and cunning Molly took instant advantage of the situation. She dropped theatrically upon her knees.
“Oh, Aunt Thalia, the big rats in the garret frightened me almost to death!” she sobbed. “I climbed out of the window into the tree, and then a big snake scared me, and I fell out of the tree down to the ground, and—and—oh—most killed myself! And—and—it just served me right, too! I ought to have been killed for my meanness to you, Aunt Thalia! I was just as naughty as I could be, but I’m downright sorry, and I’ll try never—or, ‘hardly ever’—to do it again. Won’t you please forgive me?”
Mrs. Barry looked down keenly into the lifted face. It did look pale and pathetic, and the big eyes were positively dewy. She put out her long, withered hand, on which a priceless diamond sparkled, and gently stroked the dark head.
“Louise, I don’t know but that I ought to beg your pardon,” she said, with a gentleness that was so rare in her it made the gaping negroes stare. “I—I don’t exactly think I did right putting you in the old garret. You—you might have been killed falling out of that tree! I think we must forgive each other and do better in future.”
“Oh, thank you so much, Aunt Thalia!” Molly cried, jubilantly. She even dared press a timid kiss on Mrs. Barry’s wrinkled cheek, she felt so glad that, by eating humble pie, she had saved Louise.