Aunt Emma went in, and the children pressed in after her, full of curiosity to see what crime Tiza had been committing. Poor Mrs. Backhouse! all over her clean kitchen floor there were streams of water running about, with little pieces of cabbage and carrot sticking up in them here and there, while on the kitchen table lay a heap of meat and vegetables, which Mrs. Backhouse had evidently just picked up out of the grate before Aunt Emma and the children arrived.
“Yes,” said Mrs. Backhouse, pointing to the floor, “there’s the supper just spoilt. Tiza’s never easy but when she’s in mischief. I’m sure these wet days I have’nt known what to do with her indoors all day. And what must she do this afternoon but tie her tin mug to the cat’s tail, till the poor creature was nearly beside herself with fright, and went rushing about upstairs like a mad thing. And then, just when I happened to be out a minute looking after something, she lets the cat in here, and the poor thing jumps into the saucepan I had just put on with the broth for our supper, and in her fright and all turns it right over. And now look at my grate, and the fender, and the floor, and the meat there all messed! I expect her father’ll give Tiza a good beating when he comes in, and I’m sure I shan’t stand in the way.”
“Oh no, please, Mrs. Backhouse!” said Milly, running up to her with a grave imploring little face. “Don’t let Mr. Backhouse beat her; she didn’t mean it, she was only in fun, I’m sure.”
“Well, missy, it’s very troiblesome fun I’m sure,” said Mrs. Backhouse, patting Milly kindly on the shoulder, for she was a good-natured woman, and it wasn’t her way to be angry long. “I don’t know what I’m to give John for his supper, that I don’t. I had nothing in the house but just those little odds and ends of meat, that I thought would make a nice bit of broth for supper. And now he’ll come in wet and hungry, and there’ll be nothing for him. Well, we must do with something else, I suppose, but I expect her father’ll beat her.”
Milly and Olly looked rather awestruck at the idea of a beating from John Backhouse, that great strong brawny farmer; and Milly, whispering something quickly to Aunt Emma, slipped out into the garden again. By this time father and mother had come up, and Becky appeared from the farmyard, wheeling the baby in a little wooden cart, and radiant with pleasure at the sight of Aunt Emma, whose godchild she was, so that Milly’s disappearance was not noticed.
She ran down the garden path to the cherry tree, and as, in the various times they had been together, Becky and Tiza had taught her a good deal of climbing, she too clambered up into the wet branches, and was soon sitting close by Tiza, who had turned her cotton pinafore over her head and wouldn’t look at Milly.
“Tiza,” said Milly softly, putting her hand on Tiza’s lap, “do you feel very bad?”
No answer.
“We came to take you down to have tea with us,” said Milly, “do you think your mother will let you come?”
“Naw,” said Tiza shortly, without moving from behind her pinafore.