Lucille had lately become the bride of a millionaire and adoring duke; the peerless Berengaria wrought havoc with the peace of Lord Arthur, and had more suitors than she could count on the fingers of both hands. It was a fascinating make-believe; but, as Ruth plaintively remarked, it did come with somewhat of a shock to be dragged back to earth by—socks!
She stood leaning against the mantelpiece, looking on with frowning brows while her sister collected together scattered materials, and carried them and the yawning basket back to the cosy corner in Fireland, where, for the hour, she was an invited guest.
“Quick’s the word and sharp’s the action!” cried Mollie cheerily. “Now for a grand old cobble; and if there are any heels out to-day, my fine young gentlemen, don’t blame me if you have to tread on knots for the rest of the week! It’s the strangest thing on earth that I can remember nice things year after year without an effort, and yet forget this horrid mending every Saturday as regularly as the day comes round.”
“Carelessness!” replied Ruth shortly, and with the candour of near relations. “I couldn’t forget if I tried. First thing when I wake in the morning I think of all the bothersome duties I have to do in the day, and the last thing at night I am thinking of them still. But you are so frivolous, Mollie!”
“And you are so morbid, my dear! You don’t offer to help me, I observe; and since you are so conscientious as all that, I should think you might lend me a hand in my extremity. There! I’ll give you Ransome’s for a treat; he breaks out at the toes, but his heels are intact. It’s playwork mending for him compared with the other boys.”
She tossed a collection of brown woollen stockings into her sister’s lap, and Ruth took them up, frowning heavily with her black brows, but never dreaming of refusing the request, though her own share of the household mending had kept her employed during the earlier part of the afternoon, while Mollie was amusing herself elsewhere. She took a darning-egg out of her basket, threaded a needle daintily, and set to work in the painstaking manner which characterised all her efforts; but she sighed as she worked, and Mollie sang, and that was the difference between them.
“Don’t make such a noise, Mollie; you make my head ache. Another time, I wish you would do your mending when I do mine, and then we should get a chance of a rest. Just to-day, too, when the girls are out! I hate a large family, where there is never any privacy or repose. I wish the pater could afford to send the boys to a boarding-school. It would be the making of them, and such a blessing to us.”
Mollie pursed her lips disapprovingly.
“I’d miss them horribly. They are naughty, of course, and noisy and tiresome, and make no end of work, but that’s the nature of boys; on the other hand, they are full of fun and good-humour, if you take them the right way. And they are affectionate little ruffians, too; and so good-looking. I’m proud of them on Sundays, in their Eton suits.”
“But there’s only one Sunday, and six long days of shabbiness and patches! Bruce ought to have a new school suit; the one he is wearing has descended from the other two, and is disgracefully shabby. I spoke to mother about it to-day, and she said she had intended to buy one this month, but business was bad, and there was the coal bill to pay. The old story! Business always is bad, and the coal bill is ever with us!”