"I like him awfully, you know, Tishy. In fact, I love him. It's a pleasure to hear him come into the house. Only—one's mother, you know! It's the oddity of it!"
"Yes, dear. Now, are you ready?... It only clickets down because you will not screw in; it's no use turning and leaving the key sloppy...."
"I know, Tishy dear—teach your granny! There, I think that's right now. But it is funny when it's one's mother, isn't it?"
"One—two—three—four! There—you didn't begin! Remember, you've got to begin on the demisemiquaver at the end of the bar—only not too staccato, remember—and allow for the pause. Now—one, two, three, four, and you begin—in the middle of four—not the end. Oh dear! Now once more...." etc.
You will at once see from this that Sally had lost no time in finding a confidante for the fossil's communication.
An hour and a half of resolute practising makes you not at all sorry for an oasis in the counting, which you inaugurate (or whatever you do when it's an oasis) by smashing the top coal and making a great blaze. And then you go ever so close, and can talk.
"Are you sure it isn't Colonel Lund's mistake? Old gentlemen get very fanciful." Thus Miss Wilson. But it seems Sally hasn't much doubt. Rather the other way round, if anything!
"I thought it might be, all the way to Norland Square. Then I changed my mind coming up the hill. Of course, I don't know about mamma till I ask her. But I expect the Major's right about Mr. Fenwick."
"But how does he know? How do you know?"
"I don't know." Sally tastes the points of a holly-leaf with her