"Can't they be mended?" Dorothy asked, aghast at the idea of throwing away the bits of treasured blue china.
"No, they can't. I don't want my mother's china patched up—a continual eyesore; I would rather put it out of sight."
"Poor Nellie!" said Dorothy, stooping to gather the fragments, and astonished at her own courage; "she was so eager to help."
"It was not for trying to help that she was punished," explained the mother coldly—the very tones of her voice betraying the fact that she felt the need of self-justification. "She knows very well that she has been forbidden to touch any dishes without special permission; and the fact that she forgot it only proves that she pays very little attention to commands. And you, Dorothy, are trying to help her pay less attention. I was astonished at your interference! Don't let me ever see anything of that kind again."
And then Dorothy hated the blue china pieces, and would rather throw them away than not. Still Louise lingered in the kitchen, not because the atmosphere was pleasant, but because she pitied Dorothy, who was evidently much tried still; she could not go away and leave her, perhaps to be vanquished by the tempter.
It presently transpired that Dorothy had a new and fruitful source of anxiety. The early autumn night was closing in; the rain was increasing, so were the wind and the dampness. In the kitchen, Mother Morgan herself poked the fire and added another stick, and the glow and warmth that followed were agreeable; but the bedroom door was closed, and Dorothy was almost sure that the bedroom window was open, and occasionally there came a dry little cough from the little girl shut in there, that deepened the look of anxiety on the sister's face. Her mother grew more gloomy looking as the moments passed, but Dorothy ventured yet again.
"Mother, shall I shut the bedroom window?"
"No; let the bedroom window alone."
Presently the mother descended to the cellar, and Dorothy seized the opportunity to express her anxieties.
"Nellie will catch her death in there; she must be real chilly. It is growing damper every minute, and she has a cold now. What can mother be thinking of?"