Capricious Caroline Part 16

"Baby!" she exclaimed. She darted forward and vigorously shook the shoulder of the small person devouring bread and honey.

"Oh! you greedy greed. And you had such a lot of breakfast! I never knowed such a child in all my life," commented Betty severely; then, shrugging her shoulders, she turned to Mrs. Brenton. "I can't do nothing with her!" she said.

This remark provoked a scene in which Baby amply demonstrated that honey was excellent for strengthening the vocal cords.

Finally she consented to sit on Caroline's knee whilst her hands and little person generally were made clean, and then--Betty having eaten several biscuits meanwhile--the time for halting was declared at an end.

"If we don't go now we shall get no walk; and Miss Betty, please promise to hold my hand," pleaded Dennis the maid. "She do play such pranks, ma'am, she makes my heart fair jump, that she do."

But Betty and Baby were hanging on to Caroline.

"We want you to come out with us," was their cry; and Betty added magniloquently, "We'll be most awful good if you'll come too."

Mrs. Brenton smiled into Caroline's eyes.

"Put on your things and have a good run with them," she said.

A few moments later three persons attempted to go down a very narrow staircase abreast. It was a difficult occupation, and Caroline in the centre was quite wedged in. Useless was the voice of remonstrance from Dennis in the background, Betty and Baby refused to be separated from their new companion.

"It must be managed some way," said Caroline, who had a resourceful mind; and, picking up both small grey-coated figures, she carried them down the stairs under her arms like parcels.

The result was most satisfactory.

"Do it again," said Baby delightedly. But Betty came to the rescue.

"No, no, Baby," she said, "it's cruel; can't you hear her blowing? And just look how red she is!"

Outside in the street, Betty scanned Caroline closely and critically.

"Nurse has a jacket like that, but it's new, and she wears awful smart gloves. She's a lot smarter than you...."

Dennis intervened piteously.

"Miss Betty ... my dear!"

But Caroline only laughed, and off they started down the street--a little grey fairy hooked on to either arm--so quickly that Dennis had almost to run to keep up with them.

Mrs. Brenton stood at the window and watched them with a smile till they were out of sight, then sat down to her writing again.

"It might be the very thing both for the girl and the children," she mused.

Then she opened the little note Betty had brought her from her mother.

Camilla wrote in a hurry.

"Such a fearful bore!... I have just had a telegram from Violet Lancing, inviting herself to luncheon.... I know what this means! the old story of prying and questioning, all done under a pretence of love for 'poor Ned's children.' Don't, for Heaven's sake, fail to come. I shall feel a little better if you are with me. Oh, how tired I am of being overlooked by these Lancing people! Really, I do think I shall have to do something that will make me free of this worry, at all events. Don't the children look sweet in their new coats?

"Ever yours, "Camilla."

"P.S.--Of course nurse has gone. Honestly, I should like to try this girl who is with you. She looks capable, and if she has had such a bad time with that Baynhurst woman, I dare say she would manage to rub along here. If you don't think she will do, then, darling, _do_ try and find some one else."

Another postscript:

"I have half a mind to tell Violet that Miss Graniger is the children's new governess; she is sure to pull a long face if she hears that they are without a nurse. And it would not be _quite_ untrue. What do you think?"

CHAPTER VI

Out in the Park Caroline found a land of veritable enchantment. The red sun had mounted higher into a clear, cloudless sky, and it endowed the earth with a ruddy suggestion of warmth, but it was merely a suggestion; the keen cold of the air held its own, and the grey bloom of the h.o.a.r-frost lay like a veil on the gra.s.s.

Dennis was left far behind. She had a pinched look, and her nose was red.

"Keep on the path, please, Miss Betty," she feebly protested every now and then.

But her voice was thin and weak; in any case Betty had no ears for her.

She danced, and she sang, and she curveted gracefully on the frost-covered gra.s.s.

"Isn't it lovely? I want to roll in it!" she declared, as she paused at last and panted for breath.

Baby looked up at Caroline with half-shut eyes.

"I want a bun," she said plaintively.

"A bun!" cried Caroline.... "What _is_ a bun?"

Both children exclaimed at this, and then proceeded to volunteer explanations.

"You see," Betty said to Baby, and she stooped her flower-like face confidentially to the smaller one, "she can't know as much as me and you, 'cause she was only borned yesterday, and I don't suppose she's ever eated a bun."

"Oh!" said Baby, looking at Caroline meditatively.

She had such an adorable air, standing with her little head on one side, and her eyes black as sloes, full of mysterious thought, that Caroline was obliged to hug her.

After that they had races, and Dennis watched them with pleasure and some envy as she stood s.h.i.+vering in the cold wind.

"You're the proper sort to be with children, miss," she remarked to Caroline, when at last they turned homewards. "Now I never do know what to do with 'em, and Miss Betty she does ask such queer questions too."

Caroline returned from her walk flushed and dishevelled, but happy-eyed.

It was almost impossible to recognize in her the thin, white-faced, rather defiant girl of the night before.

"What dear little loves!" she exclaimed, as she and Mrs. Brenton met.

She had accompanied the children back to their home, and was rather late in making her appearance.