"
"Don't you think some tea would do you good?" asked Mrs.
Arbuthnot tenderly.
"Tea? The idea was abhorrent to Scrap. In this heat to be
drinking tea in the middle of the day. . .
"No," she murmured.
"I expect what would really be best for her," said another voice,
"is to be left quiet."
How sensible, thought Scrap; and raised the eye-lashes of one eye
just enough to peep through and see who was speaking.
It was the freckled original. The dark one, then, was the one
with the hand. The freckled one rose in her esteem.
"But I can't bear to think of you with a headache and nothing
being done for it," said Mrs. Arbuthnot. "Would a cup of strong black
coffee--?"
Scrap said no more. She waited, motionless and dumb, till Mrs.
Arbuthnot should remove her hand. After all, she couldn't stand there
all day, and when she went away she would have to take her hand with
her.
"I do think," said the freckled one, "that she wants nothing
except quiet."
And perhaps the freckled one pulled the one with the hand by the
sleeve, for the hold on Scrap's forehead relaxed, and after a minute's
silence, during which no doubt she was being contemplated--she was
always being contemplated--the footsteps began to scrunch the pebbles
again, and grew fainter, and were gone.
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