Part 19 (1/2)

The sorrowful day seemed very long to the children. They did their lessons as usual, for auntie told them it would be much better to do so.

”Would it please mamma?” said Carrots; and when auntie said ”Yes, she was quite sure it would,” he got his books at once, and ”tried” even harder than usual.

But after lessons they had no heart to play, and there was no ”must”

about that. By bed-time they all looked worn out with crying and the sort of strange excitement there is about great sorrows--above all to children--which is more exhausting than almost anything.

”This will never do,” thought auntie. ”Hugh” (that was the name of Sybil's father) ”will have reason to think I should have taken his advice, and not told them, if they go on like this.”

”Sybil,” she said, ”Floss and Carrots will make themselves ill before the next letter comes. What can we do for them?”

Sybil shook her head despondently.

”I don't know, mother dear,” she said; ”I've got out all my best things to please them, but it's no good.” She stood still for a minute, then her face lightened up. ”Mother,” she said, ”'aposing you were to read aloud some of those stories you're going to get bounded up into a book some day? They would like _that_.”

Floss hardly felt as if she could care to hear _any_ stories, however pretty. But she did not like to disappoint kind auntie by saying so, especially when auntie told her she really wanted to know if she and Carrots liked her stories, as it would help her to judge if other children would care for them when they were ”bounded up into a book.”

So the next day auntie read them some, and they talked them over and got quite interested in them. Fortunately, she did not read them all that day, for the next day there was still more need of something to distract the children's sorrowful thoughts, as the looked-for letter did not come. Auntie would have liked to cheer the children by reminding them of the old sayings that ”No news is good news,” and ”It is ill news which flies fast,” but she dared not, for her own heart was very heavy with anxiety. And she was very glad to see them interested in the rest of the stories for the time.

I cannot tell you these stories, but some day perhaps you may come across the little book which they were made into. But there is one of them which I should like to tell you, as it is not very long, and in the children's mind it was always a.s.sociated with something that happened just as auntie had finished reading it. For it was the last of her little stories, and it was called----

CHAPTER XII.

”THE TWO FUNNY LITTLE TROTS.”

”Like to a double cherry.”

_Midsummer-Night's Dream._

'”Oh mamma,” cried I, from the window by which I was standing, to my mother who was working by the fire, ”_do_ come here and look at these two funny little trots.”'

[Auntie had only read this first sentence of her story when Sybil interrupted her.

”Mother dear,” she said, in her prim little way, ”before you begin, do tell us one thing. Does the story end sadly?”

Auntie smiled. ”You should have asked me before I _had_ begun, Sybil,”

she said. ”But never mind now. I don't really think I can tell you if it ends sadly or not. It would be like telling you the end at the beginning, and it would spoil the interest, if you understand what that means.”

”Very well,” said Sybil, resignedly, ”then I suppose I must wait. But I _won't_ like it if it ends badly, mother, and Floss won't, and Carrots won't. Will you, Floss and Carrots?”

”I don't think Floss and Carrots can say, till they've heard it,” said auntie. ”Now, Sybil, you mustn't interrupt any more. Where was I? Oh yes”]--'”_do_ come and look at these two funny little trots.”

'My mother got up from her seat and came to the window. She could not help smiling when she saw the little couple I pointed out to her.

'”Aren't they a pair of fat darlings?” I said. ”I wonder if they live in our terrace?”

'We knew very little of our neighbours, though we were not living in London, for we had only just come to St. Austin's. We had come there to spend the winter, as it was a mild and sheltered place, for I, then a girl of sixteen, had been in delicate health for some time.' [”You wouldn't believe it to see me now, would you?” said auntie, looking up at the children with a smile on her pretty young-looking face, but it was quite true, all the same.] 'I was my mother's only girl,' she went on, turning to her ma.n.u.script again, 'and she was a widow, so you can fancy what a pet I was. My big brothers were already all out in the world, in the navy, or the army, or at college, and my mother and I generally lived by ourselves in a country village much farther north than St. Austin's, and it was quite an event to us to leave our own home for several months and settle ourselves down in lodgings in a strange place.

'It seemed a very strange place to us, for we had not a single friend or acquaintance in it, and at home in our village we knew everybody, and everybody knew us, from the clergyman down to farmer Grinthwait's sheep-dog, and nothing happened without our knowing it. I suppose I was naturally of rather a sociable turn. I knew my mother used sometimes in fun to call me ”a little gossip,” and I really very much missed the sight of the accustomed friendly faces. We had been two days at St.