Page:Hollyhock house; a story for girls (IA hollyhockhousest00tagg).pdf/79

Rh it. Did you know you had torn your skirt, dear? And it’s a new one.”

“I rolled over on it, Mary, too tight—I mean the skirt was pulled down under me tight when I fell over. I was sitting on my heels, weeding. And Chum thought it was a joke and ran over to bite and yank me, so I kicked out, quite hard, I suppose, because I heard that tearing, crashing sound that you read about in stories of ships striking icebergs, and when I looked” Florimel ended her account of the disaster with a dramatic gesture downward.

“Make her mend it herself, Mary, and then wear it; she tears everything, and you mend and mend for her, and never scold her!” said Jane, frowning because Mary smiled when she should have frowned at careless Florimel.

“Certainly I shall mend it!” said Florimel, who had never been known to repair anything she had torn. “When I went with you to call on your friend, Miss Aldine, Jane, I decided to begin to mend the very first time anything happened to me! Then if Mary were sick I could mend for you, when you went on the stage, if that sloppy lot were the way you’d have to be. It was what Mrs. Moulton calls an object lesson to me.”