Black, White and Gray | Page 8

go out!" said Dennis, in an urgent whisper to his cousin, who at once ran up to her mother, and repeated the request in the midst of her conversation with Aunt Katharine. Mrs Trevor cast an anxious glance out the window.
"Well, my darling, as you have a cold and the wind is in the east, I think you had better play indoors. You can take your cousins into the long gallery and have a nice game."
Philippa frowned and pushed out her lower lip:
"I want to go out," she murmured.
"But your cough, my dearest," said her mother in a pleading tone.--"What do you say, Katharine? Would it not be more prudent for her to keep indoors?"
"I think it would be best for her to do as you wish," said Aunt Katharine, with a half smile at Philippa's pouting lips.
"I must go out with Dennis and Maisie," said the little girl in a whining voice.
"Dennis and Maisie will be quite happy indoors," said Mrs Trevor entreatingly; "you can show them your new violin, you know, and play them a tune."
"I don't want to," said Philippa, with a rising sob.
Mrs Trevor looked alarmed.
"My darling, don't excite yourself," she said; "we will see--we will ask Miss Mervyn. Perhaps if you are very warmly wrapped up."
Philippa's brow cleared at once.
"Then we may go?" she said.
"Ask Miss Mervyn to come and speak to me a moment," said her mother. "Such a difficult, delicate temperament to deal with," she continued, as the door closed on her daughter. "Not like a commonplace nature," with a glance at Dennis and Maisie; "so excitable, that it makes her ill to be thwarted in any way. Indeed the doctor forbids it."
"How bad for her!" said Aunt Katharine bluntly. "Children are never happy until they learn to obey."
"That sort of system may answer with some children," said Mrs Trevor; "but my poor delicate Philippa requires infinite tact."
"What do you think, Miss Mervyn," as a thin, careworn-looking lady entered, "of Philippa going out to-day? She wants to take her cousins into the garden for a little while."
Miss Mervyn looked anxiously from mother to daughter.
"She has been coughing this morning, and the wind is cold," she began, when she was interrupted by an angry burst of tears from Philippa.
"I must go out," she cried between her sobs. "You're a cross thing to say it's cold. I will go out."
"There, there, my darling," said Mrs Trevor; "do control yourself. You shall go.--Pray, Miss Mervyn, take care that she is warmly dressed, and has goloshes and a thick veil. You will, of course, go with the children, and keep to the sheltered places, and on no account allow Philippa to run on the grass or to get overheated."
Philippa's tears and sobs ceased at once, and soon muffled up to the eyes, she was ready to go out with her cousins, followed by the patient Miss Mervyn, and Mrs Trevor was left at liberty to bestow some attention on her guest. As soon as they were out of sight of the windows, Philippa's first action was to tear off the white knitted shawl which was wrapped round her neck and mouth.
"If you don't keep that on, we must go in again," said Miss Mervyn.
"I won't wear it, and I won't go in," said Philippa. "If you tease about it, I shall scream, and then I shall be ill; and then it will be your fault."
Poor Miss Mervyn shook her head, but after a few mild persuasions gave in, and Philip had her way as usual, not only in this, but in everything that she wished to do throughout the walk. Dennis and Maisie were used to seeing this whenever they came to Haughton, but it never ceased to surprise them, because it was so very different from their unquestioning obedience to rules at Fieldside. It certainly did not seem to make Philippa happy or pleasant. Although she did what she liked, she never appeared to like what she did, and was always wanting something different, and complaining about everything.
"Let's go back now," she said at last, dragging her feet slowly through a puddle as she spoke; "my feet are wet."
"I should think they were," sighed Miss Mervyn. "Come, let us make haste home, so that you may have your boots and stockings changed."
But the perverse Philippa would not hurry. She now lingered behind the others, and even stood still now and then, causing Miss Mervyn great misery. "She will certainly take cold," she murmured. "Cannot you persuade her, my dears, to come on."
"Let's have a race, Philippa, as far as the house," called out Dennis.
Running fast had been forbidden, so it was perhaps on that account attractive to Philippa, who at once consented to the proposal, and Miss Mervyn, thinking it the less of two evils, made