"Do you suppose you could wait till after breakfast, Susy?"
Aunt Madge smiled as she looked at the little eager face.
"I see you are going on with your lessons," said she.
"What lessons, auntie? Why, it is the holidays!"
"Lessons in patience, my dear. Isn't something always happening which you have to be patient about?"
Susy thought of Prudy's habit of disclosing secrets, Dotty's trying way of destroying playthings; and now this long delay about her present. She began to think there were a great many vexations in the world, and that she bore them remarkably well for such a little girl.
"Yes, thee must let patience have her perfect work, Susan," said grandma Read, after the "silent blessing" had been asked at the table.
"Mayn't I go, too?" said Prudy, when she saw her father, her auntie, and Susy leaving the house just after breakfast.
And she went, as a matter of course; but the pavements were a little slippery from sleet; and Prudy, who was never a famous walker, had as much as she could do, even with the help of her father's hand, to keep from falling.
"Why, Prudy," said Mr. Parlin, "what ails you this morning? You limp so much that I believe you need crutches."