that—it wasn’t fair—so I got out of the window and down the ladder.”
“You little cuss! I didn’t think you’d gimp enough for that,” said Ilse.
Emily gasped. It seemed very dreadful to be called a little cuss. But Ilse had said it quite admiringly.
“I don’t think it was gimp,” said Emily, too honest to take a compliment she didn’t deserve. “I was too scared to stay in that room.”
“Well, where are you going now?” asked Ilse. “You’ll have to go somewhere—you can’t stay outdoors. There’s a thunderstorm coming up.”
So there was. Emily did not like thunderstorms. And her conscience smote her.
“Oh,” she said, “do you suppose God is bringing up that storm to punish me because I’ve run away?”
“No,” said Ilse scornfully. “If there is any God he wouldn’t make such a fuss over nothing.”
“Oh, Ilse, don’t you believe there is a God?”
“I don’t know. Father says there isn’t. But in that case how did things happen? Some days I believe there’s a God and some days I don’t. You’d better come home with me. There’s nobody there. I was so dod-gastedly lonesome I took to the bush.”
Ilse sprang down and held out her sunburned paw to Emily. Emily took it and they ran together over Lofty John’s pasture to the old Burnley house which looked ike a huge grey cat basking in the warm late sunshine, that had not yet been swallowed up by the menacing thunderheads. Inside, it was full of furniture that must have been quite splendid once; but the disorder was dreadful and the dust lay thickly over everything. Nothing was in the right place apparently, and Aunt Laura would certainly have fainted with horror if she had seen the kitchen. But it was a good place to play. You didn’t have to be careful not to mess things up. Ilse and Emily had a glorious game of hide and seek all over the house
