"O, Susy Parlin, you naughty, naughty child, what have you been into? Who spilled that ink?"
"It got tipped over," answered Susy, in a fright, but not forgetting her promise.
"Of course it got tipped over—but not without hands, you careless girl! Do you get your shaker, and march home as quick as ever you can! I must go with you, I suppose."
Lonnie ought to have come forward now, like a little gentleman, and told the whole story; but he had run away.
"O, auntie," said Grace, "she wasn't to blame. It——"
"Don't say a word," said aunt Louise, briskly. "If she was my little girl I'd have her sent to bed. That dress and apron ought to be soaking this very minute."
Bridget listened at the foot of the stairs in a very angry mood, muttering,—
"It's not much like the child's mother she is. A mother can pass it by when the childers does such capers, and wait till they get more sinse."
Poor little Susy had to go home in the noonday sun, hanging down her head like a guilty child, and crying all the way. Some of the tears were for her soiled clothes, some for her auntie's sharp words, and some for the nice dinner she had left.
"O, aunt Madge," sobbed she, when they had got home, "I kept as far behind aunt Louise as I could, so nobody would think I was her little girl. She was ashamed of me, I looked so!"