“Mary,” she said, petulantly.  “Oh, I sent Mary away, didn’t I?  How long she’s gone!  Mona, can’t you find a screen somewhere to shade that sun a little?”

“There are screens to roll down from the veranda roof, Aunt Adelaide; but it is so shady here, and they cut off the breeze so.  However, if you want them down—–­”

“I certainly do,” said the lady, and as Mary returned then, she lowered the rattan blinds.

But they were no sooner down than Aunt Adelaide wanted them up again, and when at last she became settled in comfort, she asked Mona to read aloud to her.

“Please excuse me,” said Mona, who was thoroughly annoyed at the fussing and fidgeting ways of her aunt, “I am a very poor reader.”

“I can read fairly well,” said Patty, good-naturedly.  “Let me try.”

She picked up Mrs. Parson’s book, secretly amused to find that its title was “The Higher Health,” and she began to read as well as she could, and Patty really read very well.

“Don’t go so fast,” commanded her hearer; “valuable information like this must be read slowly, with intervals for thought.”  But when Patty provided pauses for thought, Aunt Adelaide said, petulantly, “Go on, do; what are you waiting for?”

At last, Patty purposely let her voice grow monotonous and low, and then, as she had hoped, Aunt Adelaide dropped into a doze.

Seeing that she was really asleep, Patty beckoned to Mona, and the two girls slipped away, leaving Mary in charge.

“Oh, Patty!” cried Mona, as soon as they were out of hearing.  “Isn’t it awful!  How can we stand having such a horrid old fusser around?”

“Whoopee!  Mona! moderate your language!  Mrs. Parsons isn’t so very old, and she isn’t horrid.  If she’s a fusser, that’s just her way, and we must politely submit to it.”

“Submit, nothing!  If you think, Patty Fairfield, that I’m going to be taken care of by that worry-cat, you’re greatly mistaken!”

“Stop, Mona!  I won’t let you call her such names; it isn’t nice!”

“She isn’t nice, either!”

“She’s your aunt, and your guest; and you must treat her with proper respect.  She isn’t an old lady; I don’t believe she’s fifty.  And she is ill, and that makes her querulous.”  “Well, do you want to wait on her, and read to her, and put up with her fussiness all summer?”

“It doesn’t matter whether we want to or not.  We have to do it.  Your father sent for her, and she’s here.  You can’t send her away.”

“I suppose that’s so.  But, oh, Patty, how I do dislike her!  She’s changed so.  When I saw her some years ago, she was sweet and gentle, but not so fidgety and self-centred.”

“You were so young then, Mona.  You probably thought little about her character.  And, too, her ill health has come, and that has undoubtedly ruffled her disposition.”

“Well, she’ll ruffle mine, if she stays here long.”