A Little Mother to the Others Part 17

"Awfu' sossy," answered Diana, in a cheerful voice.

"Then you beg my pardon, and you won't be naughty again?"

"I begs yous pardon, Aunt Jane," said Diana. She looked very attentively up and down her relation's figure as she spoke.

"Poor Aunt Jane, she's awfu' stout," murmured Diana, under her breath.

"I must get a good sharp arrow--oh, yes! words is nothing."

Mrs. Dolman drew out a chair near herself.

"You shall sit near me, Diana, and I will help you to your dinner,"

she said. "I hope in future you will really try to be a very good little girl."

Diana made no reply to this, but when her aunt piled her plate with nouris.h.i.+ng and wholesome food, she began to eat with appet.i.te. Towards the end of the meal she bent over towards Mrs. Dolman, and said in a confiding voice:

"Has you got woods wound here?"

"Yes, my dear; there are some nice woods about a mile away."

"I'd like to go there this afternoon, please, Aunt Jane. I has 'portant business to do in those woods." Diana looked round the table very solemnly as she said these last words. Philip could not help laughing.

"Hush, Philip! I won't have Diana laughed at," said Mrs. Dolman, who for some reason was now inclined to be specially kind to the little girl. "If you would really like to spend the afternoon in the woods, Diana, I see nothing against it," she remarked. "You are all having a holiday, and as to-morrow lessons will of course be resumed, I do not see why your wish should not be gratified. Miss Ramsay, you will of course accompany the children, and, Lucy, my dear, you can have the pony chaise, if you promise to be very careful. You can take turns to sit in it, children. And what do you say to asking cook to put up a few bottles of milk and some cake and bread and b.u.t.ter--then you need not return home to tea?"

"That would be delightful, mamma," said Lucy, in her prim voice.

"Thank you, mamma," said Mary.

"French, my dears; French!" said Miss Ramsay.

"As it is a holiday, Miss Ramsay, the children are allowed to tender their thanks to me in the English tongue," said Mrs. Dolman.

Miss Ramsay bowed and slightly colored.

"Is you going with us?" asked Diana, fixing her dark eyes full upon the governess' face.

"Yes, Diana; your aunt wishes it."

"We don't want no g'own-ups."

"Hush, Diana! you must not begin to be rude again," said Mrs. Dolman.

"Miss Ramsay certainly goes with you, please understand."

"I underland--thank you, Aunt Jane," said Diana.

She looked solemnly down at her empty plate. Her whole little mind was full of her namesake--the great Diana of long ago. She wondered if in the deep shade of the woods she might find a bow strong enough to injure her enemies.

CHAPTER X.

BOW AND ARROW.

Nothing interfered with the excursion to the pleasant woods near Super-Ashton Rectory. The children all found themselves there soon after four o'clock on this lovely summer afternoon. They could sit under the shade of the beautiful trees, or run about and play to their hearts' content.

Miss Ramsay was a very severe governess during school hours, but when there was a holiday she was as lax as she was particular on other occasions. This afternoon she took a novel out of her pocket, seated herself with her back to a great overspreading elm tree, and prepared to enjoy herself.

Lucy, Mary, and Ann surrounded Iris; Apollo marched away by himself, and Philip and Conrad mysteriously disappeared with little Orion.

Diana thus found herself alone. For a time she was contented to lie stretched out flat on the gra.s.s playing soldiers, and watching the tricks of a snow-white rabbit who ran in and out of his hole close by.

Presently, however, she grew tired of this solitary entertainment, and sprang to her feet, looking eagerly around her.

"Punishment is a very good thing," she said to herself. "I's punished, and I's lot better. It's now Aunt Jane's turn to be punished, and it's Simpson's turn to be punished--it'll do them heaps of good. First time I's only going to punish 'em, I isn't going to kill 'em down dead, but I's going to pwick 'em. I is Diana, and mother said I was to live just like the gweat Diana what lived long, long, _long_ ago."

Diana began to trot eagerly up and down under the shade of the tall forest trees. She looked about her to right and left, and presently was fortunate enough to secure a pliant bough of a tree which was lying on the ground. Having discovered this treasure, she sat down contentedly and began to pull off the leaves and to strip the bark.

When she had got the long, supple bough quite bare, she whipped some string out of her pocket, and converted it into the semblance of a bow. It was certainly by no means a perfect bow, but it was a bow after a fas.h.i.+on.

The bow being made, the arrow must now be secured. Diana could not possibly manage an arrow without a knife, and she was not allowed to keep a knife of her own. Both bow and arrow must be a secret, for if anyone saw her with them it might enter into the head of that person not to consider it quite proper for her to punish Aunt Jane.

"And Aunt Jane must be punished," muttered Diana. "I must make an arrow, and I must pwick her with it. My bow is weally beautiful--it is a little crooked, but what do that matter? I could shoot my arrow now and pwick the twees, if only I could get one made. Oh, here's a darlin' little stick--it would make a lovely arrow, if I had a knife to sharpen the point with. Now, I do wonder what sort of a woman that Miss Wamsay is."

Diana fixed her coal-black eyes on the lady.

"She looks sort of gentle now she's weading," whispered the little girl to herself. "She looked howid this morning in the schoolroom, but she looks sort of gentle now. I even seed her smile a minute back, and I should not be a bit s'prised if she didn't hate Aunt Jane too. I know what I'll do; I'll just go and ask her--there is nothing in all the world like being plain-spoke. If Miss Wamsay hates Aunt Jane, why, course, she'll help me to sharpen my arrow, when I tell her it is to give Aunt Jane a little pwick."

Accordingly Diana approached Miss Ramsay's side, and, as the governess did not look up, she flung herself on the gra.s.s near by, uttering a deep sigh as she did so. But Miss Ramsay was intent on her book, and did not take the least notice of Diana's deep-drawn breath. The little girl fidgeted, and tried further measures. She came close up to the governess, and, stretching out one of her fat hands, laid it on one of Miss Ramsay's.

"Don't touch me, my dear," said the lady. "You are much too hot, and your hand is very dirty."

"I's sossy for that," said Diana. "I had to touch you 'cos you wouldn't look up. I has something most 'portant to talk over."

"Have you indeed?" replied Miss Ramsay. She closed her book. The part she was reading was not specially interesting, and she could not help being amused with such a very curious specimen of the genus child as Diana Delaney.

"Well, little girl, and what is it?" she asked.

"I 'spects," said Diana, looking very solemnly into her face, "that you and me, we has both got the same enemies."

"The same enemies! My dear child, what do you mean?" asked Miss Ramsay.

"I 'spects I's wight," said Diana, tossing her black head. "I's not often wrong. I wead your thoughts--I think that you has a desp'ate hate, down deep in your heart, to Aunt Jane."

"Good gracious!" cried the governess, "what does the child mean? Why should I hate Mrs. Dolman?"

"But why should not you?--that's the point," said Diana.

"Well, I don't," said Miss Ramsay.

Diana looked intently at her. Slowly, but surely, her big black eyes filled with tears; the tears rolled down her cheeks; she did not attempt to wipe them away.