There was the guardianship to be arranged, the cottage to be found, and the middle-aged lady to be advertised for.  She, indeed, must be secured at once; got to come at once to the Cosmopolitan and preside over the twins until they all proceeded in due season to The Open Arms.  She must be a motherly middle-aged lady, decided Mr. Twist, affectionate, skilled in managing a cook, business-like, intellectual, and obedient.  Her feminine tact would enable her to appear to preside while she was in reality obeying.  She must understand that she was there for the Annas, and that the Annas were not there for her.  She must approach the situation in the spirit of the enlightened king of a democratic country, who receives its honours, accepts its respect, but does not lose sight of the fact that he is merely the Chief Servant of the people.  Mr. Twist didn’t want a female Uncle Arthur let loose upon those blessed little girls; besides, they would have the dangerous weapon in their hands of being able to give her notice, and it would considerably dim the reputation of The Open Arms if there were a too frequent departure from it of middle-aged ladies.

Mr. Twist felt himself very responsible and full of anxieties as he paced up and down alone, but he was really enjoying himself.  That youthful side of him, so usual in the artistic temperament, which leaped about at the least pleasant provocation like a happy lamb when the sunshine tickles it, was feeling that this was great fun; and the business side of him was feeling that it was not only great fun but probably an extraordinarily productive piece of money-making.

The ignorant Annas—­bless their little hearts, he thought, he who only the night before on that very spot had been calling them accursed—­believed that their L200 was easily going to do everything.  This was lucky, for otherwise there would have been some thorny paths of argument and convincing to be got through before they would have allowed him to help finance the undertaking; probably they never would have, in their scrupulous independence.  Mr. Twist reflected with satisfaction on the usefulness of his teapot.  At last he was going to be able to do something, thanks to it, that gave him real gladness.  His ambulance to France—­that was duty.  His lavishness to his mother—­that again was duty.  But here was delight, here at last was what his lonely heart had always longed for,—­a chance to help and make happy, and be with and watch being made happy, dear women-things, dear soft sweet kind women-things, dear sister-things, dear children-things....

It has been said somewhere before that Mr. Twist was meant by Nature to be a mother; but Nature, when she was half-way through him, forgot and turned him into a man.

CHAPTER XXII

The very next morning they set out house-hunting, and two days later they had found what they wanted.  Not exactly what they wanted of course, for the reason, as Anna-Felicitas explained that nothing ever is exactly, but full of possibilities to the eye of imagination, and there were six of this sort of eye gazing at the little house.