durable—especially in a Starr. And that abominable Jimmy was chuckling again! Elizabeth should suppress him!
Fortunately Ellen Greene appeared at this juncture and announced supper.
“You’ve got to wait,” she whispered to Emily. “There ain’t room for you at the table.”
Emily was glad. She knew she could not eat a bite under the Murray eyes. Her aunts and uncles filed out stiffly without looking at her—all except Aunt Laura, who turned at the door and blew her a tiny, furtive kiss. Before Emily could respond Ellen Greene had shut the door.
Emily was left all alone in the room that was filling with twilight shadows. The pride that had sustained her in the presence of the Murrays suddenly failed her and she knew that tears were coming. She went straight to the closed door at the end of the parlour, opened it, and went in. Her father’s coffin stood in the centre of the small room which had been a bedroom. It was heaped with flowers—the Murrays had done the proper thing in that as in all else. The great anchor of white roses Uncle Wallace had brought stood up aggressively on the small table at the head. Emily could not see her father’s face for Aunt Ruth’s heavily-fragrant pillow of white hyacinths lying on the glass, and she dared not move it. But she curled herself up on the floor and laid her cheek against the polished side of the casket. They found her there asleep when they came in after supper. Aunt Laura lifted her up and said,
“I’m going to take the poor child up to bed—she’s worn right out.”
Emily opened her eyes and looked drowsily about her.
“Can I have Mike?” she said.
“Who is Mike?”
“My cat—my big grey cat.”
