"You may bet on that," was the reply. "That is just where we would show our good sense."
"Your filthy habits, you mean."
"Well, either, whichever suits you. But you haven't said what was in the wind."
"None came this way to-day, we could not tell."
"We are going to close the house to-morrow, Guy, so you need not come home to dinner. We intend going to the woods to find fresh air."
But Guy didn't like the idea; it sounded common, he thought. Every day he met a lot of women and their babies, with a parcel of brats following them, going over the river or somewhere. "Why can't you take a week each of you, and go to the country like other people?"
That, "like other people," was too much for Ruth, and she said, sharply: "We can't be what we are not. Beggars must not be choosers."
Guy replied in as sharp a tone that "some people liked to make a parade of their poverty," and finished his dinner in silence. This unfortunate affair threw a damper over the girls, but the children did not come within the shadow of the cloud. Ruth had a sudden angry impulse not to go at all, scarcely knowing why, as it would not spite her brother. But she could not yield to such a thought when the happiness of Agnes and the children was to be considered.
Agnes spoke very little after the occurrence, knowing what state of mind Ruth was in, but she sang in a low voice some of her sister's favorite hymns, and in a little while the cloud rolled away, the sun came out, and the storm was all over. By tea-time Guy and Ruth were as if nothing unpleasant had happened, but there was no allusion made to the pic-nic.
"I wonder how people feel who are going on an extended tour," said Agnes, as they filled their lunch baskets.