Just go up as if you were going to your own room. You can manage it. I don’t want any of those relatives to know where we are, see?”

“Sure thing!” said Tryon and turned immediately back to his game. Not that the rest of the game was very well played, but they played, those two, with eager young determined faces and busy wondering minds. There was a look of their dead father in their faces as they accepted their role and went forward in this program that their sister had set for them. She didn’t usually have much time anymore to interest herself in them, but now sorrow had leveled their lives together as when they were small children, and Jennifer was the nearest to a mother that was left.

With a matter-of-fact manner Jennifer went to the other end of the enclosure and watched the other two children for an instant, then walked firmly over to them.

“Karen, Robin, come on upstairs with me. I’ve got something to talk to you about.”

“I isn’t been doing nussin’ naughty!” said Robin, with suddenly alarmed eyes. “Did my nurse say I had?”

“No, of course not, honey. I haven’t seen your nurse. But I want you all upstairs a few minutes. It’s something nice, so you needn’t worry. I think perhaps I’ve got a few pieces of candy up in my room. Do you want some?”

“Wes!” said Robin, delightedly hopping down from the swing. “Is we going to your room?”

“No, we’re going up in the playroom, but I’ll get the candy and bring it up. Come on.”

She held out a hand to each, and they came happily enough. Their older sister hadn’t been noticing them much of late. They had a forlorn feeling that the world was made up of nurses and cooks and they must walk carefully alone to escape getting in the way of any of them. Nobody had had time to realize how desolate the two youngest had been since the accident.

Jennifer had a sudden feeling of joy in the warm little hands that were nestled in her own, a sense that they were her special care now and it was to her they must look. She was surprised that it brought a tender, pleasurable thrill to her sad, fierce young heart. She squeezed the two confiding young hands, and Karen and Robin looked up at her and smiled with a sudden light like new sunshine in their apathetic little faces.

“I like you, Jennifer,” said Karen wistfully. “I wish you would stay home with us always.”

“Wes!” said Robin. “I viss you vass our nurse. I don’t wike hers wery much. She makes me vash my hands too much.”

“Well, that’s too bad!” said the sister sympathetically. “But you don’t want to have dirty hands, do you?”

“No, but I don’t wike her. I wiked my over nurse better.”

“Well, that’s too bad, too,” said Jennifer, giving a little gasp at the thought of all the questions that must be waiting ahead for her to settle, things her father and mother used to manage.

“Now,” she said briskly, “I’ll tell you what I want. I want to get you both upstairs to the playroom just as quietly as possible. You know, there are a lot of aunts and other people down in the living room, and we don’t want to disturb them while they are talking, so we are going up the kitchen stairs. See how very quietly you two can walk so you won’t make the least bit of sound on the stairs. Robin, where is your nurse?”

He stopped short in his tracks at the memory.

“That’s all right, Robin, I’ll see she doesn’t spank you.