‘emmeline, it’s your turn to choose a game to-day. what story shall we do?’

‘no, micky; it’s your turn,’ put in his twin sister kitty. ‘emmeline chose the day before yesterday.’

‘i know it’s my turn really, kitty, but gentlemen always let ladies choose,’ said eight-year-old micky with dignity. ‘i’d very much advise “swiss family robinson,” because it seems such a splendid opportunity, now the curtain-rods are down, to use the short ones as sugar-canes; and mary’s so sorry we’re going away to-morrow that she won’t be cross even if the paint does get a little kicked off the bath when it’s being wrecked.’

‘micky, i think it’s horrid of you to talk of mary’s being sorry like that,’ said emmeline—‘just[2] as if you didn’t care a bit about our having to leave the home of a lifetime, and the only real friend who has been with us since we were babies, to go and live with an aunt who doesn’t care for us!’

‘how do you know aunt grace doesn’t care for us? she’s always very jolly when she comes here, and she never forgets birthdays,’ said micky, who had a sense of justice. ‘she sends such sensible things, too—postal orders, or steam-engines that really work, or real good books of adventure. she never gives you poetry-books.’ this last was a sore point with micky just then, for his godmother had recently presented him with a gilt-edged volume of ‘the poetical works of william wordsworth,’ for which he had been expected to write a laborious round-hand letter of thanks.

‘presents are all very well, but they don’t prove that a person loves you,’ said emmeline; ‘and as to her being jolly when she comes here, she never stays more than a day or two at a time, and always seems in a great hurry to get back to london again. do you think, if she had really cared anything about us, she would have left us a whole year after darling mother died before offering to come and look after us?’

this was rather out of micky’s depth, so he prudently changed the subject. ‘well, let’s get[3] started with the game,’ he said, ‘else we shall have to get tidy for tea before we’ve even been properly wrecked.’

but emmeline was not to be put off so easily. ‘micky,’ she demanded solemnly, ‘how can you be so taken up with story-games when we’re as good as living a story ourselves?’

the twins’ eyes sparkled. anything savouring of romance was as the breath of life to them, and emmeline was really rather impressive when she talked in that grave way.

‘how do you mean?’ asked kitty, eagerly.

‘why, what i have just been saying,’ replied emmeline. ‘here are we, three orphans, left to the care of a worldly aunt——’

‘but are you quite sure she’s worldly?’ asked kitty, looking alarmed. kitty was not altogether clear what ‘worldly’ meant, but from the way emmeline pronounced the word it sounded like something very bad.

‘i’m afraid so,’ said emmeline. ‘i remember once, when mother and i spent a night with her in london, and she and her friend kept talking about a ball they had just been to.’

‘but balls aren’t wrong, are they?’ asked kitty. emmeline was twelve, and kitty regarded as a great authority on all questions of morals.

‘i don’t know that they’re exactly wrong,’[4] acknowledged emmeline, ‘but they are a great waste of time. when i’m grown up i never mean to go to them, but shall spend all my time working for the poor. besides, it isn’t only her going to balls that makes me think aunt grace worldly, but the way she dresses and—everything. i quite expect that when we know more of her we shall find her just like one of the fine ladies one reads of in books.’

‘will she be cruel to us, do you suppose?’ asked kitty with zest. she did not really believe that merry, good-natured aunt grace could be cruel, any more than she really, at the bottom of her heart, believed in a romance of micky’s about a certain blood-thirsty burglar who lived in the spare-room wardrobe, but it made life more exciting to pretend to herself that she did.

‘of course not. what a silly question, kitty!’ exclaimed emmeline impatiently. ‘i dare say she will be too busy with parties and so on to bother herself much about us, but she’ll be quite kind—at least, to us. punch is the only one i feel at all doubtful about.’ she flung herself down on to the hearthrug, and rested her head against that of a fox-terrier who was lying there half asleep, and who gave a little growl of remonstrance at being disturbed. ‘we hadn’t got him when she was here last, you[5] see, so we can’t tell what she’ll think of him. i shouldn’t a bit wonder if she didn’t let us bring him to woodsleigh, or even if she does, she’ll keep him chained up all day, poor darling! people who think much about clothes never do like dogs, except just silly little toy things.’

micky and kitty broke out together in a chorus of indignation and horror.

‘if they are so horrid as to chain punch up in the kennel all day i shall jolly well stay out with him and keep him company!’ shouted micky.

‘oh, emmeline, you don’t really think there’s any danger of aunt grace not letting darling punch come?’ said kitty, almost in tears.

‘well, i hope not,’ said emmeline; ‘anyhow i’ve written to her about it, so till we’ve had time to get her answer there’s no use worrying any more.’ there was not, but the very suggestion that punch might have to be left behind had cast a gloom upon the party—a gloom which did not altogether lift even when the brilliant idea struck micky that the brooms in the housemaid’s cupboard, if placed upside down and balanced against the wall, would make excellent palm-trees for the robinsons’ desert island.

on the whole, emmeline was the happiest of the three just then, for, grieved as she was at leaving mary and possibly punch, the prospect[6] of going to live with her aunt was not altogether without its secret charm for her. the good little girl who had such a beautiful influence on her worldly relations played a prominent part in several of her favourite books, and it was that part which emmeline pictured herself playing with regard to aunt grace. she would have been ashamed to express this idea in so many words even to herself, far more to the twins, but it none the less reconciled her a good deal to the new life which lay before them.

emmeline bolton had always been a child of the type whose virtue specially appeals to nurses. all the grown-up people, indeed, who had ever been brought much into contact with her agreed in considering her a very good girl. in some respects she deserved their favourable opinion, for she was truthful, obedient, and conscientious by nature, but perhaps the fact that she had never been very strong had more to do with her reputation for goodness than she herself or anyone else quite realised.

the child lived in an atmosphere of warm and constant approval which was not altogether wholesome. such had been the state of affairs two years ago, when all three children had fallen ill of measles. micky and kitty had had the disease lightly, but with emmeline it took a serious form. for two days and nights she had[7] lain delirious, and there came a moment when mary, believing her to be unconscious, had sobbed out to the trained nurse: ‘i always had a feeling that the dear child was too sweet and good to be long for this world!’

this presentiment proved a groundless one. as emmeline grew better the words which she had heard in her half-delirious state came back to her, and she dwelt on them constantly. just at first they frightened her a little, but when she had become quite strong and well again she ceased to be alarmed, and only felt pleasantly elated at being too good to be long for this world. it almost—though not quite—made up for having straight brown hair and a pale peaked face instead of golden curls and glowing cheeks like the twins, who were so pretty that people in the street sometimes turned round to look after them.

if emmeline’s mother had lived she would probably have perceived that the child was in grave danger of growing into a little pharisee, and she might have done something to check it, but she had become very ill almost as soon as the children had recovered from the measles, and had died less than a year later. after her death the children had gone on living at the old home at eastwich, a great east anglian town, under the joint charge of mary and miss rogers, their daily governess. the arrangement was never intended[8] to be more than a temporary one, for their aunt, miss bolton, who was also their guardian, wished them to go and live with her at woodsleigh, a place some twelve miles distant from eastwich, as soon as she regained possession of a cottage there, which had been left her by her father, but let for several years past. mary was to go to her own home to keep house for a brother, so that to-morrow, when her children, as she always called them, went to begin their new life with aunt grace, she would have to be left behind at eastwich.

‘come, my darlings,’ said mary, landing so abruptly on the swiss family robinson’s desert island that most of the palm-trees were knocked over, ‘tea’s quite ready, and there’s buttered toast and coffee.’

buttered toast and coffee were always regarded as special treats, but somehow to-day nobody seemed to have quite as much appetite for them as usual. mary and micky kept making jokes, and they all tried to be very merry, but not even the presence of punch, who was allowed to sit on a chair between the twins in special honour of the occasion, made the festivity much of a success. they could none of them forget it was the last tea with mary in the old home.

emmeline stayed up that evening until some time after the twins had gone to bed, and sat[9] on the floor leaning her head against mary’s knee.

‘well, my darling,’ said mary after a while, ‘i hope you’ll all be very happy and good with your aunt grace. of course some of her ways may be a bit different from what you’re used to, but there, i’m sure she’s as well-meaning a young lady as ever breathed, and we know that everything must work out for the best, or it wouldn’t be let happen. well, i know you’ll always be a good child, dear miss emmeline, and help master micky and miss kitty, bless their dear little hearts!’

poor mary! she would have been horrified if she could have guessed that any words or tone of hers could have led emmeline to set aunt grace down as worldly, for mary was a thoroughly good woman, but all unconsciously a little accent of doubtfulness showed itself in her voice and confirmed emmeline’s impression.

for several years past the little girl had undressed herself, but for this last time mary put her to bed just as she had done in the far-off days of emmeline’s dimmest memories.

long after mary had kissed her good-night the child lay awake, thinking how dreary it would be at woodsleigh to have no old nurse to tuck her up, and passionately resolving that, come what might, she at least would always keep true to the[10] old ways mary had taught her. she made the resolution purely and simply out of loyalty to mary, and not with any view to her mission towards aunt grace, which for the moment she had quite forgotten.