"You go down, M-Molly! I'll come in a minute!"
Molly fled.
"S-she's coming, Aunt Kezia." She gave a terrified giggle, and took her
place next to the Atom.
There was a pause. All heard a light pattering step outside and glanced
towards the door. Nothing happened.
Miss Kezia stood gaunt and grim; no one spoke. Denis's head drooped
low; he had folded his hands meekly before him. The door handle was
touched--there was another pause--then it was turned abruptly, suddenly,
and Nell marched in. Head back, looking straight in front of her,
biting her lip, frowning, she marched in, took her stand beside Ted, and
implored him in a shaky whisper not to make her l-laugh. Then Miss
Kezia began. She started on the vulgarity and danger of racing in
hansoms in London. She pointed out the trouble in which they might have
involved their drivers. She emphasised the scandal there would have
been had they been pursued by the police, and Sheila Pat's face grew
full of longing. From hansoms she went on to the awful iniquity of
having left the house unguarded; from that to Sarah's holiday, of which
she disapproved strongly. From Sarah's holiday she ranged austerely to
grease stains, untidiness, foolish hilarity, and hysteria. She threw in
various uncomplimentary remarks on feather-heads, untrustworthiness,
rowdyism, and other things of a similar nature, and then in a final tone
she wound up:--
"I shall forbid all intercourse between you and Master Lancaster for a
month!"
There was a sudden movement, an uplifting of heads, a very definite and
unmistakable change in the faces confronting her.
"Aunt Kezia--" Denis began, and his tone left nothing to the imagination
with regard to the nature of the thing he meant to say. Miss Kezia cut
in with sudden and very wise haste:--
"No, I shall not do that, but I shall write to your parents by this
mail, and tell them how you failed to behave with any decorum in my
absence. Now you may go."
They did go. They fled.
*CHAPTER XXVII*
Nell rose with a headache.
"I never," said she, "owned such a thing at home!"
She went to the window and looked out. A dingy grey fog hung over
everything; the garden walls were wet.
"The fourth day that has been foggy and raw and liquid with mud!"
Sheila Pat trotted back into the room, her small face pinched, her teeth
shut tight to prevent their chattering.
"Sheila Pat, you've had a cold bath!"
"I let the hot tap run a minute."
"And the hot water was tepid. Come here."
"I'm busy, Nell."
Nell went across and seized the shivering little body. Even through the
bath-robe she could feel how cold it was. She started rubbing her down
with a rough towel.
"You're awfully tiresome, Sheila Pat. If you will be such a baby, I
shall have to come and get your bath ready myself."
"Y-you all have cold s-sponges!" sulked Sheila Pat, with chattering
teeth.
"And so will you when you've grown bigger and stronger. Didn't Dr.
McCarthy tell you so?"
"Is it s-strong? Feel my muscles! I j-just _love_ icy-c-cold baths!"
"You look as if you do!"
"I think you're v-very rude, Nell O'Brien!" The Atom, after this
dignified retort, relapsed into a cold silence.
"Now go and get Molly up, there's a good Atom," Nell said when Sheila
Pat was clothed. "I can hear she's not moving."
The Atom departed.
"She's up now," she announced on her return.
"_Well_ up?"
"I dipped her sponge in the jug, and squeezed it on her feet. She's
very cross."
"I daresay she is. You're an ingenious little torturer, Sheila Pat."
Presently a wild-haired Molly burst into the room.
"Oh, Nell, I _can't_ find any hair-ribbons, and my comb has tumbled
down--I stuck it in the window to stop it rattling, and it's tumbled
out--"