e counting twenty. Do you suppose if that dear,
blessed lady didn't put her hand into her pocket in the way she does that
you'd be having the right good time you are now having, and the nice
clothes, and the good education, and the pretty ponies coming next week?
And Miss Pauline, just because she's a bit pale, taken to the seaside?
Not a bit of it, my dear Miss Patty. It's thankful you ought to be to the
Providence that put it into your aunt's head to act as she has done. Ah!
if my dear mistress was living she would bless her dear sister."

"Did you know mother before she was married?" asked Patty, taking up a
skirt and the pair of sharp scissors which nurse provided her with, and
sitting down happily to her task.

"Didn't I live with her when she was Miss Tredgold?" asked nurse. "And
didn't I over and over again help Miss Sophia out of scrapes? Oh, she was
a wild young lady!"

"You don't mean to tell me that Aunt Sophy ever did anything wrong?"

"Nothing mean or shameful; but for temper and for spirit and for dash and
for go there wasn't her like. Not a horse in the land was wild enough to
please her. She'd ride bareback on any creature you gave her to mount,
and never come to grief, neither. She broke horses that trainers couldn't
touch. She had a way with her that they couldn't resist. Just a pat of
her hand on their necks and they'd be quiet and shiver all over as though
they were too delighted for anything. Oh, she did follow the hounds! My
word! and she was admired, too. She was a young lady in a thousand. And
as for wanting to have her own way, she was for all the world like our
Miss Pauline. It strikes me those two have very much in common, and that
is why Miss Tredgold has taken such a fancy to your sister."

"Do you think she has?" asked Patty.

"Do I think it?" cried nurse. "For goodness' sake, Miss Patty, don't cut
the material. Do look where you are putting the scissors. Do I think it,
miss? I know it. Miss Marjorie, sweet pet, you shall thread these
daisies. You shall make a pretty chain of them to put around your neck.
There's my little precious."

Fat, lovely, little Marjorie shrieked with delight when nurse put a
coarse needle, to which was attached an equally coarse piece of cotton,
and a basket of daisies before her. Marjorie tried to thread daisies, and
uttered little cries of happiness, while Patty and nurse talked together.

"Miss Tredgold was a wonderful young lady, so handsome and high-sp