Part 7 (1/2)

”I _knew_ something would happen to Norah. It always does if she says nasty things.”

”Rubbish, Mollie! That's nonsense! She fell down because her bolster was so big, and she couldn't see where the stairs came!” cried Pattie.

”I'm going to see where she's hurted herself,” announced little Kitty; and she trudged off, leaving Pattie and Mollie to sort the heap of odds and ends that lay on the landing.

They went about it in doleful silence at first.

Then Mollie said, ”This _is_ my counterpane--isn't it, Pattie?”

”No; that's Norah's. Don't you see the corner all crumpled up which she holds in her hand when she goes to sleep?”

”Oh dear! oh dear! I don't think, after all, that it's _easy_ having a B. D. S. It seemed just to spoil it all when Norah went thumping down--down, like a big ball.”

Pattie gave a little sigh, too, and was putting down the chair she was carrying that she might rest her arms and have room for another deeper sigh, when mother's voice was heard calling--

”Mollie! Pattie! I want you down here!”

Off they ran, feeling down in their little hearts that mother _must_ know how to put things happy again.

First of all they looked with interested and pitying eyes at Norah, whose head had become an odd shape, and whose face was white and patchy.

Then they stood side by side with Kitty, watching mother's face, and waiting.

”The B. D. S. has had a bad beginning, dears,” she said. ”I don't think it was a good plan to pull everything out of your rooms to start with.