"Very nice that your aunt is coming, I allow," said Mrs. Lesly, "but I do not know what to say to Lucy, all little girls are not so good as my Amy."
"It would be unkind to refuse her," said Mabel.
"And if she is not well, poor child," added her mother. "I quite forget how old Lucy is, she cannot be so very little after all."
"But," said Amy, "aunt calls her, her little girl, and says she will be very good; if she were grown up like Mabel, of course she would not be naughty."
"I do not know that," said Mrs. Lesly, with a smile, "grown up people are often as naughty as little ones; so either way she was right to promise. Well, we must have the spare room opened, it must be quite damp, I fear, after being shut up so long."
"Oh, no, mamma," said Mabel, "I open the windows every morning, myself, so that I am sure the room is well aired."
"There must be a fire there, however, I suppose," replied her mother, trying to exert herself to think.
"Yes, Betsy shall light a fire there to-day, and I will see that the room is comfortable."
"But stay," said Mrs. Lesly, who was always troubled by anything like arrangements, "who is to sleep in Lucy's room when Caroline is gone. I am afraid we cannot manage it."
"We will see how old she is when she comes," suggested Mabel, "and if she is afraid to sleep by herself Betsy must sleep with her; but from what I remember she cannot be very young."
"Well then, my dear," said her mother, "and so you will promise to contrive to make everything comfortable; now nothing makes me so ill as arranging, and your poor papa never left me anything of that kind to think of. I remember once going down to Weymouth, when you were a baby. I could not tell what I should do there, being obliged to sleep at an hotel, for the first night, for we could not find a lodging, the town was so very full. So when we came there, we could get nothing but a small, uncomfortable room; and some how or other, we could not find any of the baby's things without pulling our boxes all about so, and I was so tired and teased, that I sat down, and--and--
"'Annie,' said he, 'now don't cry--I can bear anything better than your tears--leave everything to me--it will be much the easiest plan.'