I have made up my mind who is the best
teacher for her, and whom she will chose.'
Rhoda gave a comical groan. 'Don't say it's I,' she pleaded. 'I
dread it. Please I am not good enough, I don't know how; and
besides, she gives me the creeps!'
Mistress Mary turned on Rhoda with a reproachful smile, saying, 'You
naughty Rhoda, with the brightest eyes, the swiftest feet, the
nimblest fingers, the lightest heart among us all, why do you want to
shirk?'
Mistress Mary had noted the fact that Lisa had refused to sit in an
unpainted chair, but had dragged a red one from another room and
ensconced herself in it, though it was uncomfortably small.
Now Rhoda was well named, for she was a rose of a girl, with damask
cheeks that glowed like two Jacqueminot beauties. She was much given
to aprons of scarlet linen, to collars and belts of red velvet, and
she had a general air of being fresh, thoroughly alive, and in a
state of dewy and perennial bloom. Mary was right in her surmise,
and whenever she herself was out of Lisa's sight or reach the child
turned to Rhoda instinctively and obeyed her implicitly.
CHAPTER V--THE NEW PLANT GREW
'Now, Rhoda dear,' said Mistress Mary one day, when Lisa had become
somewhat wonted to her new surroundings, 'you are to fold your hands
respectfully in your lap and I will teach you things,--things which
you in your youth and inexperience have not thought about as yet.
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