Daisy blushed, and looked very much embarrassed.
“Well, I couldn’t enjoy good things to eat when I knew you had nothing but bread and milk,” she admitted, at which Molly promptly threw her arms round her sister’s neck, and hugged her.
“I believe you’re the best girl in the world, Daisy,” Dulcie declared. “We never should have gotten into such a scrape if you had been with us. I knew it wasn’t right all the time, but it was such an exciting adventure, and we never had a real adventure in our lives.”
“I don’t believe I should like an adventure,” said Maud, virtuously. “Aunt Julia has put Paul to bed, you know. She’s sure he’s caught some dreadful disease. She wanted to send for the doctor but Grandma wouldn’t let her.”
“What kind of a disease is it?” Molly wanted to know.
“I’m not sure, but I think it’s something called nerves. That was it, wasn’t it, Daisy?”
“Oh, I don’t believe Paul is going to be ill at all,” said Daisy, reassuringly. “Grandma doesn’t think so either. Aunt Kate laughed, and said Paul wasn’t the first boy in the family to come home with a black eye. She was beginning to tell about something that happened when Papa was a boy, when Grandma gave that little cough she always gives when she wants people to stop talking, and Aunt Kate didn’t say any more.”
“Do you suppose Papa ever fought with anybody when he was a boy?” suggested Molly, her face brightening at the delightful possibility.
“I don’t know, but we’ll ask him in our next letter. Now let’s do something pleasant. It’s a whole hour till bedtime.”
But for once Daisy’s cheerful suggestion failed to meet with its usual response. Neither Dulcie nor Molly felt inclined to do “anything pleasant” that evening. They tried lotto, but before the first game was finished Dulcie had begun to cry again.