Part 14 (1/2)
”But you see--well, he is something like a servant. She tells him what to do, and if he doesn't do it right she can find fault with it. But you are--well, the house is yours. You can do what pleases you.”
”Quite reasoned out, little one;” and he laughed with an approving sound.
”It's curious that you scold people you like, and other people may do the same thing and--is it because you don't dare to? If it is wrong in the one place, why not in the other?”
”Perhaps politeness restrains us.”
”I don't like people to scold. Miss Eunice never does.”
”Eunice has a sweet nature. Doesn't Miss Winn ever scold you?”
”Well--I suppose I am bad and wilful sometimes, and then she has the right. But when you do things that do not matter----”
Miss Winn was walking in the garden. Cynthia waved her hand, but walked leisurely forward.
”I couldn't imagine what had become of you.”
”It was my fault,” interposed Chilian. ”I met her at the gate and asked her to go for a walk.”
”And with that soiled ap.r.o.n!”
”That came off the slate. I hadn't any desk. It was hard to hold it on my knee.”
”You might have come in for a clean one. Run upstairs and change it.”
But she was destined to meet Cousin Elizabeth in the hall. The elder caught her arm roughly.
”Where have you been gadding to, bad girl? Didn't you know you must come straight home from school? Here we have been worried half to death about you, and I'm tired as a dog, trotting 'round all day. You deserve a good whipping;” and she shook her. She would have enjoyed slapping her soundly. But Chilian entered at that instant.
”She is going upstairs for a clean ap.r.o.n,” he said. ”I took her off for a walk.”
”She might have asked whether she could go or not,” snapped Elizabeth.
”She's the most lawless thing!”
”It was my place. Don't blame the child!”
”Well, supper's ready.”
She didn't have her ap.r.o.n on quite straight and her hair was a little frowsy. Elizabeth had proposed it should be cut short on the neck for the summer, but Miss Winn had objected.
”Such a great mop! No child wears it!”
Cynthia came in quietly and took her place. After her first cup of tea Elizabeth thawed a little, enough to announce that two of the Appleton children were ill, they thought with scarlet fever.
Chilian expressed some sympathy.
”And how was the school, Cynthia? We thought you might have been kept in for some of your good deeds, as children are so seldom bad.”
”I--I didn't like it,” she answered simply.
”Children can't have just what they like in this world,” was Elizabeth's rejoinder.