Her mother smiled. "That is the way you look at it. Well, we get along somehow without them, thanks to Aunt Sarah. I am sorry I did not try to be more friendly to Helen. She was dominated by her mother and it was no doubt a choice between her and you children. She was very fond of you as a baby and she has not forgotten. Her mother's sadly jealous and envious spirit is what has made all the trouble."
"I was four years old when they went away," said Nan. "I don't remember them at all, though I remember dear daddy perfectly."
"Let's not talk of it any more," said Mrs. Corner.
"Aunt Helen said we might see each other again some day. Do you suppose they will come back and will be nice to us and let us go up there sometimes?"
"We cannot say. I do not look into the future to find such possibilities, Nannie. You must not build too many air-castles."
"Oh, but I like to," replied Nan. "It's lots of fun to do it and if they don't amount to anything I've had the fun of the building and nobody's hurt when they tumble down."
"In that case I suppose it doesn't make much difference, and when one is naturally a castle-builder it is hard to give up the habit."
"It isn't as bad as sucking one's fingers as Jean does, for it doesn't put my mouth out of shape; it only amuses me and I often forget my castles an hour after they are ten stories high. I suppose I am not to tell the children about Aunt Helen."
"No," said Nan with a mature air. "I think it's best not. They mightn't understand. Besides, as she isn't a polywog nor a newly hatched bird, Mary Lee wouldn't be very much interested in her."
[Illustration: CHAPTER IV A MOTHER'S SECRET]
The first days of autumn brought back school days. Aunt Sarah had gone to visit a nephew in lower Maryland, leaving behind her mementoes in the form of the coat of paint for the front fence, a new cover for the living-room table, and many stitches put in made-over garments for the children. She had further dispensed her bounty in a direction of which the children as yet knew nothing, and it was Nan who first heard of it from her mother.
Aunt Sarah's absence was felt in more ways than one. Mrs. Corner was her favorite niece. A tiny grave in the old churchyard marked the resting place of her namesake, Nan's elder sister, who was her mother's first-born and who lived but three short months. It may have been that Aunt Sarah's heart went out more tenderly toward her own sister's child because of this loss which was so heavy a grief to them both, but whether it was because of this bond between them or because they mutually loved and respected each other, it is true that any sacrifices which Miss Dent felt she could make she made for the Corner family, and when she was with them no task was too heavy for her, and her wise counsel and helpful hands were greatly missed by Mrs. Corner.