In a moment her arms were round him, and she was kissing him fondly.
'Neville,' she said, 'my own dear boy! David's boy! And where is little Kathleen? Oh, my poor children! What an arrival!—what a journey! How can I have made such a mistake?'
'Kathie,' said Neville, and Kathleen slowly got up from her seat and came forward. 'She is half dead, Aunt Clotilda,' said Neville apologetically. But Miss Clotilda wanted no apologies. Her heart was far too unselfish and tender to think of anything but the children themselves.
'Kathleen!' she exclaimed. 'Can this be little Kathie? Why, my darling, you will soon be as tall as your old aunt. But all the more you must be dreadfully tired—you cannot be very strong, my dear, growing so fast. Oh, I shall never, never forgive myself. What can we give them to eat, Martha?'
Martha was already concocting something in a little pan on the fire.
'I'm heating up some milk, miss, and I'll have an egg beat in a moment, and we'd better add a spoonful of sherry wine. And there's the plum-cake, or some nice bread and butter.'
'Which would you rather have, dear children?' said Miss Clotilda.
Neville decided in favour of bread and butter, and though Kathleen said she was too tired to eat, she succeeded in the end in getting through two good slices of the delicious home-made bread and fresh butter. Thanks to this and the cup of hot milk, her spirits began to revive, and she even got the length of smiling graciously when poor Miss Clotilda's self-reproaches grew too vehement, and assuring her aunt that she would be all right again to-morrow. Indeed, it would have required a much harder heart than childish, impulsive Kathie's to have resisted any one so affectionate and devoted as their father's sister, and already Neville's eyes sparkled with pleasure as he said to himself it felt almost like having a mother again.
Then old Martha, who had been busy up-stairs, came back to say the rooms were ready,—so far ready, that is to say, as they could be on such short notice.