Consequently, old Mrs. Marrable was not in her best form when her young ladyship arrived, and Benjamin the coachboy came up the garden pathway as her harbinger to see if she should descend from the carriage to interview the old lady. She did not want to do so, as she felt she ought to get Mrs. Prichard home as soon as possible; but wanted, all the same, to fulfil her promise of delivering Sister Nora's parcel with her own hands. She was glad to remain in the carriage, on hearing from Benjamin that both Granny Marrable and her daughter were on the spot; and would, said he, be out in a minute.
"They'll curtsey," said Gwen. "Do, dear Mrs. Picture, keep awake one minute more. I want you so much to see Dave's other Granny. She's such a nice old body!" Can any student of language say why these two old women should be respectively classed as an old soul and an old body, and why the cap should fit in either case?
"I won't go to sleep," said Mrs. Prichard, making a great effort. "That must be Dave's duck-pond, across the road." The duck-pond had no alloy. She did not feel that her curiosity about Dave's other Granny was quite without discomfort.
"Oh—had Dave a duck-pond? It looks very black and juicy.... Here come the two Goodies! I've brought you a present from Sister Nora, Granny Marrable. It's in here. I know what it is because I've seen it—it's nice and warm for the winter. Take it in and look at it inside. I mustn't stop because of Mrs.... There now!—I was quite forgetting...." It shows how slightly Gwen was thinking of the whole transaction that she should all but tell Blencorn to drive home at this point, with the scantiest farewell to the Goodies, who had curtsied duly as foretold. She collected herself, and continued:—"You remember the small boy, Mrs. Marrable, when I came with Sister Nora, whose letter we read about the thieves and the policeman?"
"Ah, dear, indeed I do! That dear child!—why, what would we not give, Ruth and me, to see him again?"
"Well, this is Mrs. Picture, who wrote his letter for him. This is Granny Marrable, that Dave told you all about. She says she wants him back."
And then Maisie and Phoebe looked each other in the face again after half a century of separation. Surely, if there is any truth in the belief that the souls of twins are linked by some unseen thread of sympathy, each should have been stirred by the presence of the other. If either was, she had no clue to the cause of her perturbation. They looked each other in the face; and each made some suitable recognition of her unknown sister. Phoebe hoped the dear boy was well, and Maisie heard that he was, but had not seen him now nigh a month. Phoebe had had a letter from him yesterday, but could not quite make it out. Ruth would go in and get it, for her ladyship to see. Granny Marrable made little direct concession to the equivocal old woman who might be anything, for all she was in her ladyship's carriage.
"I suppose," said Gwen, "the boy has tried to describe the accident, and made a hash of it. Is that it?"
"Indeed, my lady, he does tell something of an accident. Only I took it for just only telling—story-book like!... Ah, yes, that will be the letter. Give it to her ladyship."
Gwen took the letter from Widow Thrale, but did not unfold it. "Mayn't I take it away," she said, "for me and Mrs. Picture to read at home? I want to get her back and give her some food. She's knocking up."