Page:Leah Reed--Brenda's summer at Rockley.djvu/356

336 The conversation thus far had been rather puzzling to Julia and Miss South.

Amy had not pretended to understand the drift of it at all, and, indeed, while the others were talking, she had  been bending over the crib with the little baby, and as he  stirred in his sleep, she fanned him gently with the paper  fan which she wore at her belt.

But she was not prepared for the exclamation with which Brenda greeted this last remark of Mrs. Silva’s. It was so loud a “What do you mean?” that Amy hastily turned around.

Mrs. Silva and Brenda were both bending over the picture, and Amy heard Brenda say, “But don’t you know Mrs. Rosa?”

“I never heard of her,” responded Mrs. Silva. “Who is she?”

“Why, she is a Portuguese woman who used to live in Boston; and when I told her that your little boy was dead,  she said, ‘Poor Maria!’”

“But that is n’t my name; it’s Nellie, is n’t it, mother?”

“Well, by rights it’s Ellen,” said Mrs. Moriarty, with a twinkle in her eye. “But you do be called Nellie most always.”

“Why, Maria’s the name of Miguel’s wife. She’s my sister-in-law.”

“Oh!” said Brenda.

“There,” said Julia, “that is it; your husband has a brother. Does he look like him?”

“Oh, as like as two peas in a pod; they ’re twins, and