The Boys And I Part 20

"I don't quite know," I said. "Mrs. Partridge said we should have a very strict nurse, and I don't know how it was the boys thought she'd whip them."

Uncle Geoff looked rather grave again.

"I must go," he said. "I will let Miss Goldy-hair,"--he smiled again when he said it--"I will let her know that I can't let Tom out to-day and that his good little sister won't leave him;"--how kind I thought it of Uncle Geoff to say that!--"and I must do the best I can to find a nice nurse for you--one that won't whip you, Racey."

"Must Tom go to bed?" I asked.

"No," said Uncle Geoff, "if he keeps warm and out of the draughts. Mrs.

Partridge will come up to see him; but you needn't be afraid, Audrey, I'm not going to say anything about last night to her. You and I have made an agreement, you know."

Mrs. Partridge did come up, and she was really very kind--much kinder than she had been before. She was one of those people that get nicer when you're ill; and besides, Uncle Geoff had said something to her, I'm sure, though I never knew exactly what. Any way she left off calling us naughty and telling us what a trouble we were. But it was all thanks to Miss Goldy-hair, Tom and I said so to each other over and over again. No one else could have put things right the way she had done.

Tom was very good and patient, though his throat was really pretty bad and his head ached. Mrs. Partridge sent him some black currant tea to drink a little of every now and then, and Uncle Geoff sent Benjamin to the chemist's with some doctor's writing on a paper and he brought back some rather nasty medicine which poor Tom had to take every two hours.

But though I did my very best to amuse him, and read him over and over again all the stories I could find, it seemed a very long, cold, dull morning, and we couldn't help thinking how different it was from what we had hoped for--spending the day with Miss Goldy-hair, I mean.

"If only we hadn't gone out in the cold last night you'd have been quite well to-day, Tom," I said sadly.

"Yes, but then we wouldn't have found Miss Goldy-hair," said Tom.

"I don't see that it's much good to have found her," said I. I was rather dull and sorry about Tom, and I didn't know what more to do to amuse him. "I don't believe we'll see her for ever so long, and perhaps she'll forget about us as she has such a lot of children she cares for."

"But they're _poor_ children," said Tom, "she can't like them as much as us. She said so."

"She didn't mean it that way," I said. "She'd be very angry if she'd heard you say that, as if poor children weren't as good as rich ones."

"But she _did_ say so," persisted Tom. "When I asked her if going to see the poor children was as nice as if she had us always, she said no."

"Well, she meant it wasn't as nice as if she was mother and had her own children always. She didn't mean anything about because they were poor. _I_ believe she likes poor children best. Lots of people do, and I'm sure we've lots of trouble too, though we're not poor. If we'd been poor like the ones in _Little Meg's Children_, or _Froggy's Brother Ben_, Miss Goldy-hair would have been here _ever_ so early this morning, with blankets and coals, and milk, and bread and sugar--"

"And 'tawberry dam and delly and 'ponge cakes and olanges and eberysing," interrupted Racey, coming forward from his corner.

[Ill.u.s.tration: In walked Miss Goldy-hair herself!]

I had been "working myself up," as Pierson used to call it, and I was fast persuading myself that Miss Goldy-hair was very unkind, and that after all we were poor deserted little creatures, but for all that I couldn't help laughing at Racey breaking in with his list of what he thought the greatest delicacies. Tom laughed too-- I must say in some ways Tom was a very good little boy in spite of his sore throat, and Racey was standing with his head on one side considering what more he would wish for in Miss Goldy-hair's basket, when--_wasn't_ it funny?--there came a little tap at the door, and almost before we could say "come in," it opened, and--oh, how delighted we were--in walked Miss Goldy-hair herself!

She was smiling with pleasure at our surprise, and wonderful to say, she was carrying a big, big basket, such a big basket that Tom, who had very nice manners for a boy, jumped up at once to help her with it, and in the nice way she had she let him think he was helping her a great deal, though really she kept all the weight of it herself, till between them they got it landed safely on the table.

Racey danced forward in delight.

"Audrey, Audrey," he cried, "her _has_ got a basket, and her _has_ come.

Her said she would."

Miss Goldy-hair stooped down to kiss his eager little face. Then she turned to me and kissed me too, but I felt as if I hardly deserved it.

"Did you think I had forgotten you, Audrey?" she said.

I felt my cheeks get very red, but I didn't speak.

"Didn't you promise to trust me last night?" she said again.

"Yes, Miss Goldy-hair, but I didn't know that you'd come to see us because Tom was ill. You said you'd come to fetch us to have dinner and tea with you, but I didn't know you'd come when you heard Tom couldn't go out."

"Why, don't you need me all the more because you can't go out?" she said brightly. "I'm going to stay a good while with you, and I have brought some little things to please you."

She turned to the basket which Racey had never taken his eyes off. We all stood round her, gazing eagerly. There were all sorts of things to please us--oranges, and a few grapes, and actually a little shape of jelly and some awfully nice funny biscuits. Then there were a few books, and two or three little dolls without any clothes on, and a little packet of pieces of silk and nice stuffs to dress them with, and a roll of beautiful coloured paper, and some canvas with patterns marked on it, and bright-coloured wools.

"I've brought you some things to amuse you," said Miss Goldy-hair, "for Tom can't go out, and it's a very cold, wet day, not fit for Audrey or Racey to go out either. And as your tutor won't be coming as Tom's ill, it would be a very long day for you all alone, wouldn't it?"

Then she went on to explain to us what she meant us to do with the things she had brought. Some of them were the same that the children she had told us about had to amuse them when they were ill, and she let Tom and Racey choose a canvas pattern each, and helped them to begin working them with the pretty wools.

"How nice it would be to make something pretty to send to your mother for Christmas! Wouldn't she be surprised?" she said; and Tom was so pleased at the thought that he set to work very hard and tried so much that he soon learnt to do cross-st.i.tch quite well. Racey did a little of his too, but after a while he got tired of it and went back to his horses, and we heard him "gee-up"-ing, and "gee-woh"-ing, and "stand there, will you"-ing in his corner just as usual.

"What a merry little fellow he is," said Miss Goldy-hair, "how well he amuses himself."

"Yes," I said, "he hasn't been near so dull as Tom and me. He was only frightened for fear the new nurse should whip him. But Uncle Geoff has promised she sha'n't, and so now Racey's quite happy and doesn't mind anything. I don't think he minds about mother going away now."

"He's such a little boy," said Miss Goldy-hair.

But I was a little mistaken about Racey. He thought of things more than I knew.

Then Miss Goldy-hair helped me to begin dressing the little dolls. They were for a little ill girl who couldn't dress them for herself, as she had to lie flat down all day and could hardly move at all because her back was weak somehow, but she was very fond of little dolls and liked to have them put round her where she could see them. I had never dressed such small ones before, and it was great fun, though rather difficult.

But after I had worked at them for a good while Miss Goldy-hair told both Tom and me that we'd better leave off and go on with our work in the afternoon.

"It's never a good plan to work at anything till you get quite tired,"

she said. "It only makes you feel wearied and cross, and then you never have the same pleasure in the work again. Besides, it must be nearly your dinner-time, and I must be thinking of going home."

[Ill.u.s.tration]

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER XI.

OUR TEA-PARTY.

"Please to draw your chair-- The table's ready."

"Going home! Oh! Miss Goldy-hair," we all called out, "oh! we thought you were going to stay with us all day."

Racey had come out of his corner and stood staring at Miss Goldy-hair.

"Are you kite alone in the world?" he said gravely, "are you, Miss Doldy-hair?"

"Racey," I said, giving him a little shake, "how can you be so rude?"