"She"s here!" returned Dorothy, in the same awe-struck voice.
"Oh, dear!" sighed her twin.
"_Now_ we"re in for it," rejoined Dorothy.
Then both together they exclaimed: "Poor papa!"
It was a solemn moment for the whole household, and the twins felt it.
CHAPTER V
AUNT DORA
"I feel just like running away," said Dora, "and staying until Auntie goes."
"Don"t do it," begged Dorothy, "for I shall have to go, too."
"Poor papa!" they both exclaimed again.
"No. We shall have to stay and brace papa up," admitted Dora.
"We"ve just _got_ to," groaned her twin.
"And if she begins to nag him again about giving one of us up----"
"We won"t leave him," declared Dorothy, very firmly.
"_I_ wouldn"t live at her house for a fortune!" repeated Dorothy.
"Come on! let"s see how the land lies," suggested Dora. "Perhaps the worst of it"s over."
"No such luck," groaned Dorothy. "There"s Betsey."
They ran up the winding path to the kitchen porch. The gentle, pink-faced old lady who met them at the door, had a worried brow.
"Hush, girls! you"re aunt is here," she whispered.
"We know it. We saw the windows of the best room wide open. Is she making Mary clean the room all over again?"
"Yes," sighed Mrs. Betsey. "Your aunt declared it smelled musty from being shut up. She has _such_ a nose," and the little old lady shook her head.
"Interfering old thing!" snapped Dora.
"Hush! you must not speak so," admonished Mrs. Betsey.
"Well, she _is_," declared Dorothy, of course agreeing with her twin.
"Where is she?" queried Dora.
"With your father in the hot-house."
"Come on, then," said Dora to her sister. "Let"s get it over right away."
They heard voices in the conservatory, for the sashes were open on this warm day. There was the stern, uncompromising tone of Aunt Dora, and the gentle, worried voice of Mr. Lockwood. The twins never liked to hear their father"s voice when he was worried, and they saw to it--with Mrs.
Betsey--that it did not occur frequently. But there was no help for it when Aunt Dora was about!
First of all, the twins heard their aunt say:
"You"re no more fit to bring up girls, Lemuel, than I am to steer one of these dratted airships the papers are full of!"
"No. You are right," said Mr. Lockwood. "The comparison is just. You would _not_ do well in an airship, Dora."
"Huh! I should think not! And you"re as little fit to bring up two girls--and twins, at that!"
"But--but I don"t really bring them up," said Mr. Lockwood, apologetically. "Mrs. Betsey does that."
"Mrs. Betsey!" with a sniff.
"And really, they get along very well, Sister."
"They get along well because they are no trouble to you."
"Well, isn"t that as it should be? They are good girls--and loving girls."
"I declare to man! Lemuel Lockwood, you haven"t any more idea of what those girls need than a babe unborn."
"What _do_ they need, Dora?" asked worried Mr. Lockwood.
"They need a strong hand--a stern and uncompromising spirit to govern them--that"s what they need!" declared the militant aunt.
"But Dora, they are good girls and make me no trouble at all."
"Of course they make you no trouble. You let them do exactly as they wish."
"No, no!" urged Mr. Lockwood, hastily. "They don"t always do as they wish. Sometimes we haven"t the money to let them do _with_. I"ve heard Mrs. Betsey say so. And--and--why, there is one of them who likes three lumps of sugar in her coffee; but I always reprove her for it. That is extravagance."
"Huh!" sniffed Aunt Dora.
"Otherwise they are no trouble to me at all," said Mr. Lockwood, briskly. "They are not, I a.s.sure you. We live a very quiet and peaceful life here."
"Yah!" exclaimed his sister. "That is all you want--peace."
"I admit it--I admit it," returned her brother. "I am naturally retiring and of a peaceful disposition, Dora."
"You"re a natural born fool, Lemuel!" declared his sister, so sharply that the twins, who were inadvertently listening at the door, hesitating to go in, fairly jumped. "I want to tell you right now that you are a disgrace to manhood! You"ve never amounted to a row of beans since you were out of pinafores. If your little property wasn"t tied up hard and fast so that you could only use the income of it, you would have frittered it all away long ago, and left these children penniless.