There were the fragments of the pink cup and saucer; the leaf-green and brown majolica bits that had been the pickle-dish; the iridescent curved sides of George's wife's lemonade-glass; Aunt Em's shattered souvenir pitcher; Abbie Carter's cracker-jar with its smashed wheat-heads. Myra only looked bewilderedly; but on Nell's gaping face apprehension succeeded stupefaction and dissolved in its turn into a great brimming tenderness.
"Scold you, Mother? Oh, Mother—what must you think me! (Oh, poor Mother—poor Mother—she's gone daft!)"
"I always admired pretty broken bits of chiny," old Mrs. Bray confessed. "But the pitcher was a accident—reely it was, Nellie. I never went to let that fall. My arm breshed it. But the sasser and the pickle-dish and George's wife's lemonade-glass and Abbie Carter's cracker-jar—I done them apurpose. And I can't say I regret the pitcher, nuther."
"Yes, Mother! Yes, yes! It's all right; I understand. (Myry, don't you leave her! I thought she was gettin' childish, but Oh—to think—I'll have John go for Doc Bradley right away. Let 'er amuse herself—but don't you leave her alone a minute! Poor Mother! Poor old Mother! Aplayin' with broken chiny dishes!)"
"What's Nell awhisperin' to ye?" inquired old Mrs. Bray, sharply. "There's nothin' to whisper about as I know. Did ever you see anything purtier than this pink chiny piece, Myry? It broke so clean, and curved as a petal. And this here piece of George's wife's lemonade-glass—it's handsome as a brooch. See how the flower come out! Why, Myry, I've set here and fairly eat off these dishes!"
"Yes, Mother. But sha'n't we put them up now! Some one might drop in—Nell bein' here."
She could not bear that Marvin and John and the doctor should see this pitiful child's play.
Old Mrs. Bray assented with the utmost good nature. She drew up a box of lacquer and proceeded to lay her china service carefully and dextrously away. She set the box quite openly along the shelf beside her bonnet-box and the snug, little brown round pasteboard roll that held her little old round muff. Presently they heard steps in the sitting-room. Some one had dropped in—but it was only Marvin and John and old Doc Bradley.
Marvin's face held a look of scared apprehension; John's withheld judgment; Nell was frankly red-eyed. She had been walking fiercely back and forth in the yard unable to face again that piteous picture.
The only unclouded faces there were Doc Bradley's and old Mrs. Bray's. She gave him a shrewd look. He returned it in kind. "So—o—" said old Mrs. Bray, noting their various scrutiny. There was even an effect of state about her as she settled herself in her special rocker. But she said, quite simply and conversationally,