Her nerves were, in fact, calmed by the interval, and when Mrs.
Aylward took off her spectacles and shut up her book, it had become
possible to endure the terrors of the lonely chamber.
CHAPTER VIII. THE ENCHANTED CASTLE.
A little she began to lose her fear.--MORRIS.
Aurelia slept till she was wakened by a bounce at the door, and the
rattling of the lock, but it was a little child's voice that was
crying, "I will! I will! I will go in and seem by cousin!"
Then came Mrs. Aylward's severe voice: "No, miss, you are not to waken
your cousin. Come away. Where is that slut, Jenny?"
Then there was a scuffle and a howl, as if the child were being
forcibly carried away. Aurelia sprang out of bed, for sunshine was
flooding the room, and she felt accountable for tardiness. She had
made some progress in dressing, when again little hands were on the
lock, little feet kicking the door, and little voices calling, "Let
me in."
She opened the door, and white nightgowns, all tumbled back one over
the other.
"My little cousins," she said, "come and kiss me."
One came forward and lifted up a sweet little pale face, but the other
two stood, each with a finger in the mouth, right across the threshold,
in a manner highly inconvenient to Aurelia, who was only in her stiff
stays and dimity petticoat, with a mass of hair hanging down below her
waist.
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