Verena's face was very white; her big brown eyes were full of tears.
"I ought to be glad and to say 'Welcome.' But I am not glad, and I don't welcome you, Aunt Sophia. We like our own way; we don't mind being savages, and it is untrue that we are selfish. We are not. Each would give up anything, I think, for the other. But we like our poverty and our rough ways and our freedom, and we--we don't want you, Aunt Sophia."
"Nevertheless you will have to put up with me," said Miss Tredgold. "And now, to start matters, please tell me exactly how you spend your day."
"Our life is not yours, Aunt Sophia. It would not interest you to know how we spend our day."
"To-morrow, Verena, when the life of rule succeeds the life of misrule, I should take umbrage at your remark, but to-night I take no umbrage. I but repeat my question."
"And I will tell you," said Pauline in her brisk voice. "We get up just when we like. We have breakfast when we choose--sometimes in the garden on the grass, sometimes not at all. We walk where we please, and lose ourselves in the Forest, and gather wild strawberries and wild flowers, and watch the squirrels, and climb the beech-trees. When it is fine we spend the whole day out, just coming back for meals, and sometimes not even then, if Betty gives us a little milk and some bread. Sometimes we are lazy and lie on the grass all day. We do what we like always, and always just when we like. Don't we, Renny?"
"Yes," said Verena. "We do what we like, and in our own way."
"In future," said Miss Tredgold, "you will do things in my way. I hope you will not dislike my way; but whether you like or dislike it, you will have to submit."
"But, Aunt Sophia," said Verena, "what authority have you over us? I am exceedingly sorry to seem rude, but I really want to know. Father, of course, has authority over us, but have you? Has anybody but father? That is what I want to know."
"I thought you might ask something of that sort," said Miss Tredgold--"or, even if you did not ask it, you might think it--and I am prepared with my answer. I quite recognize that in the case of girls like you I have no authority, and I cannot act fairly by you until I have. Now, my dear girls, please understand that before I go to bed to-night I get that authority. I shall get it m writing, too, so that you can none of you gainsay it, or slip past it, or avoid it. When the authority comes, then will also come the happy life of rule, for the life of misrule can never be really happy--never for long. Believe me, I am right."