Terry | Page 8

wicked. Nurse, do you?"
"Don't I indeed? And my good gown in rags, and my cap in smithereens!"
"I'm very sorry about that, Nursey dear, indeed I am. I couldn't have believed Vulcan could be so stupid as to end it all that way. He just got in a fright when he saw you coming in. And I thought you would have been so delighted with the fun. And Gran'ma will get you a new gown and a new cap when I tell her all about it."
Nurse took no notice of her protests.
"Both of you drenched to the skin! Let me feel your things! Every stitch on you sopping with wet! I'll have to get a warm bath ready for you, and put you in bed. And it's well if I can let you up to see your gran'mama at tea-time."
"Oh, Nurse, and I did so want to show her the things I worked for her! She wouldn't be angry; not if I told her myself. I know it would make her laugh--"
"'Deed, and you sha'n't tell her a word of it, Miss Terry. If she was asleep and didn't hear the scrimmage, we'll just leave her in peace about it."
"Oh, is it as bad as that?" said Terry. "So bad that I am not to tell Gran'ma?"
"It is as bad as bad--as that it couldn't be badder!" cried Nurse Nancy. "My gown and cap ruinated, my nursery spattered with mud, the back stairs like a street with clay an' rain, yourselves drenched an' drownded, an' your clothes spoiled. And into the bargain," added Nancy, with a quaver in her voice, "my spectacles broken into smash, an' I without e'er another pair to see my way about the house with!"
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"Your spectacles!" cried Terry, now at last stricken with remorse. "Oh, Nursey, do you really mean that your spectacles are broken?"
Nurse Nancy answered by holding up an empty rim from which all trace of glasses had departed.
Then Terry said no more, but crept meekly into her little bed, burrowed into the pillows, and wept.
CHAPTER IV
DREADFULLY GOOD
The destruction of Nurse Nancy's spectacles was a real tragedy. Between the hills and the sea spectacles are not found growing like limpets on the rocks, or shaking on the wind like the bog-flowers. The rule in Trimleston House with regard to these necessary articles was that Granny's cast-off spectacles fell to Nancy, who was younger than her mistress, and who was nicely suited by glasses that had ceased to be powerful enough for Madam.
"Has Granny none to give you, Nursey?" asked Terry, with repentant eyes fixed on Nancy's small brown orbs so deeply set in wrinkles.
"No, child, no. She got her new ones from Dublin only a week ago. And myself got the ould ones. Suited me nicely, they did. And now I may sit down and wait till Madam's eyes require another new pair."
"But can't we write for some for you, Nursey, as Granny did?"
"Well, now! Just as if they had my name and my number in Dublin, same as your gran'mama's, an' her a great lady! Sure, poor people do have to walk into a shop, and just try and try till they get a pair to fit them."
Terry sat on the old woman's knee, and threw her arms round her neck.
"I'll darn the stockings, and sew on the strings and buttons, and read your prayer-book to you, and read the newspaper to you after Grandma has done with it. Is there anything else I can do for you, Nursey darling?"
"Nothing in the world, except try to be good an' keep out of mischief, Miss Terry."
"But I do so want to be good always, Nancy. And I never would be in mischief if I knew it was mischief. It looks so right while I'm doing it, and I don't know how it can be that all of a sudden it goes wrong--"
"Not all of a suddent, Miss Terry. It's always wrong from the beginning with you. If you would only stop and ask your elders at first 'Is this wrong?' before you go at it--"
"But I couldn't do that, unless I had an idea that it was going to be wrong, even perhaps. It always seems to me the rightest, sweetest, loveliest thing in the world--"
"Now, Terry, how can you look me in the face and say you thought it was right to take a big, wet, lumbering watch-dog out of his kennel on a wet day and bring him upstairs to your nursery, dripping his wet over everything, and then dress him up--"
"Oh, Nancy!" cried Terry, splitting into laughter and putting her hands before her face. "Oh, now, wasn't it simply deliciously funny? If you had only been there before he jumped! His eyes were so sweet under your frills, and his paws were