“You are very silent little mice, this morning,” she said.  “Is it because poor Nurse is ill that you seem in such low spirits?”

Duke and Pamela looked at each other.  It would have been so easy to say “yes,” and Grandmamma would have thought them so kind-hearted and sympathising!  Once one has swerved a little bit from the straight exact road and begun to go down-hill even in the least, it is so tempting to go on a little farther—­so much less difficult than to stop short, or, still more, to try to go back again.  But these children were so unused to say anything not quite true that they hesitated, and this hesitation saved them from making another step in the wrong direction.

“I wasn’t finking of Nurse, Grandmamma,” said Pamela at last in rather a low voice.

“Nor I wasn’t neither,” said Duke, taking courage by her example.

“That’s all right, then,” said Grandmamma cheerfully, not having noticed anything unusual in their tone.  “Poor Nurse, we are sorry for her to be ill, but I don’t think it will be anything very bad.  And I am sure you will try to be very good.”

“Yes, Grandmamma,” said the two voices together, but less confidently and more timidly than usual.  This time their tone caught the old lady’s attention.

“There’s something on their minds,” she said to herself.  But she was a wise old lady, and thought it better to wait a while before trying to find out what it was.

“When I was a little girl,” she began—­and the children pricked up their ears—­“when I was a little girl I remember once that our nurse was ill, or she had to go away to see some friend who was ill, and, as I was the eldest of several little brothers and sisters, I had to help to take care of them.  I had always thought it would be very pleasant to be without a nurse, though we liked ours very well, and to be able to do just as we wished.  But I shall never forget how pleased I was to see her come back again,” and Grandmamma laughed a little at the recollection.

“Why were you so pleased, Grandmamma?” asked Pamela.  “Had you done anyfing naughty?”

“That wouldn’t have made Grandmamma pleased for her nurse to come back,” said Duke; and a sudden thought of how “us” would have felt had Nurse come into the room just as Toby was licking up the last of the bread and milk made his face grow rosy.

“We had not meant to be naughty,” said Grandmamma, “but we were not fit to manage for ourselves.  Each of us wanted to do a different way, and we were like a flock of poor little sheep without a shepherd.  You do not know, children, what a comfort it is to have rules one must obey.”

“But big people don’t have to obey,” said Duke.