CHAPTER XV.

That evening Blue and Red were sent to bed rather in disgrace, because they had professed themselves too sleepy to finish sewing a seam their mother had given them to do.

Very sleepy, very glad to fold up their work, they made their way, through the cold empty room which was intended to be the drawing-room when it was furnished, to one of the several bedrooms that opened off it.  There was only one object in the empty room which they passed through, and that was the big family carriage, for which no possible use could be found during the long winter, and for the storing of which no outside place was considered good enough.  It stood wheelless in a corner, with a large grey cloth over it, and the girls passing it with their one flickering candle looked at it a little askance.  They had the feeling that something might be within or behind it which would bounce out at them.

Once, however, within their small whitewashed bedroom, they felt quite safe.  Their spirits rose a little when they shut the door, for now there was no exacting third person to expect anything but what they chose to give.  Theirs was that complete happiness of two persons when it has been long proved that neither ever does anything which the other does not like, and neither ever wants from the other what is not naturally given.

They were still sleepy when they unbuttoned each other’s frocks, but when they had come to the next stage of shaking out their curly hair they began to make remarks which tended to dispel their drowsiness.

Said Blue, “Is it very dreadful to be a dentist?”

Said Red, “Yes; horrid.  You have to put your fingers in people’s mouths, you know.”

“But doctors have to cut off legs, and doctors are quite——­”

There is another advantage in perfect union of twin souls, and that is, that it is never necessary to finish a remark the end of which does not immediately find expression on the tip of the tongue, for the other always knows what is going to be said.

“Yes, I know doctors are,” replied Red; “still, you know, Principal Trenholme said Mr. Harkness is not a well-bred American.”

“His first name is Cyril.  I saw it on the card,” replied Blue, quitting the question of social position.

“It’s a lovely name,” said Red, earnestly.

“And I’ll tell you,” said Blue, turning round with sudden earnestness and emphasis, “I think he’s the handsomest young man I ever saw.”

The rather odd plan Mrs. Rexford had hit on for lessening the likeness between these two, clothing each habitually in a distinctive colour, had not been carried into her choice of material for their dressing-gowns.  These garments were white; and, as a stern mood of utility had guided their mother’s shears, they were short and almost shapeless.  The curly hair which was being brushed over them had stopped its growth, as curly hair often does, at the shoulders.  In the small whitewashed room the two girls looked as much like choristers in surplices as anything might look, and their sweet oval faces had that perfect freshness of youth which is strangely akin to the look of holiness, in spite of the absolute frivolity of conduct which so often characterises young companionship.