Us | Page 4

Toby."
"Perhaps not," said Grandpapa. "Let us hope it was Toby."
"Nevertheless," said Grandmamma, who had quite disengaged herself from her netting by this time, "Pamela must remember that she is growing a big missy, and it does not become big misses to run about so as to tear their gowns."
Pamela listened respectfully, but Grandmamma's tone was not alarming. The little girl slowly edged her way along from Grandpapa's chair to Grandmamma's.
"Did you never tear your gowns when you were a little missy, Grandmamma?" she inquired, looking up solemnly into the old lady's face. Grandmamma smiled, and looked across at her husband rather slily. He shook his head.
"Who would think it indeed?" he said, smiling in turn. "Listen, my little girl, but be sure you tell it again to no one, for it was a little bird told it to me, and little birds are not fond of having their secrets repeated. Once upon a time there was not a greater hoyden in all the countryside than your Grandmamma there. She swam the brooks, she climbed the trees, she tore her gowns----"
"Till at last my poor mother told the pedlar the next time he came round he must bring her a web of some stuff that _wouldn't_ tear to dress me in," said Grandmamma; "and to this day I mind me as if it had been but last week of the cloth he brought. Sure enough it would neither tear nor wear, and oh how ugly it was! 'Birstle peas' colour they called it, and how ashamed I was of the time I had to wear it. 'Little miss in her birstle-peas gown' was a byword in the countryside. No, my Pamela, I should be sorry to have to dress you in such a gown."
"I'll try not to tear my nice white gowns," said the little girl; "Nurse said she would mend it, but it would take her a long time. Grandmamma," she went on, suddenly changing the subject, "what does a 'charge' mean, 'a great charge?'"
"Yes," said Marmaduke, who heard what she said, "'a very great charge.'"
Grandpapa's eyes grew brighter.
"Can they be speaking of a field of battle?" he said quickly. But Duke turned his large wistful blue eyes on him before Grandmamma had time to answer.
"No, sir," he said, in his slow earnest way, "it wasn't about battles; it was about us."
"She said us was that thing," added Pamela.
"Who said so?" inquired Grandmamma, and her voice was perhaps a little, a very little, sharp.
"Nurse said it," said Pamela. "It was when us had felled down, and the old woman was at the door of her house, and she asked if us was hurt, and Nurse was vexed, and then she said that."
"What old woman?" asked Grandmamma again.
"Her that makes the cakes," said Duke.
"Oh, Barbara Twiss!" said the old lady in a tone of relief. "Now, my dear children, kiss Grandpapa and kiss me, and say good-night. I will explain to you when you are bigger what Nurse meant. God bless you and give you a nice sleep till to-morrow morning!"
The two little creatures obeyed at once. No "oh, _mayn't_ we stay ten minutes"'s, "just five minutes then, oh please"'s--so coaxingly urged, so hard to refuse--of the little ones of our day! No, Marmaduke and Pamela said their "good-nights" in dutiful fashion, stopping a moment at the door before leaving the room, there to execute the military salute and the miniature curtsey, and went off to bed, their curiosity still unsatisfied, as children's curiosity often had to remain in those times when "wait till you are big and then you will be told" was the regular reply to questions it was not easy or desirable to answer otherwise.
There was a moment's silence when they had left the room. Grandpapa's face was once more hidden in his newspaper; Grandmamma had taken up her netting again, but it did not go on very vigorously.
"I must warn Nurse," she said at last. "She means no harm, but she must be careful what she says before the children. She forgets how big they are growing, and how they notice all they hear."
"It was no great harm, after all," said Grandpapa, more than half, to tell the truth, immersed in his paper.
"Not as said to a discreet person like Barbara," replied Grandmamma. "But still--they have the right to all we can give them, the little dears, as long as we are here to give it. I could not bear them ever to have the idea that we felt them a burden."
"Certainly not," agreed Grandpapa, looking up for a moment. "A burden they can never be; still it is a great responsibility--a great charge, in one sense, as Nurse said--to have in our old age. For, do the best we can, my love, we cannot be to