"What did Hugh say?" asked Jack curiously. "Or didn't you ask him? And Aunt Trudy makes such a fuss about your hair--wasn't she horrified?" Rosemary's expressive face shadowed. "Hugh was just dear to me!" she said enigmatically, "but Aunt Trudy was so silly. She cried and cried and said what would my mother say and wasn't I ever going to have any respect for her wishes--she is so tiresome, she really is, Jack." "Then you must have been told not to have it bobbed and went ahead like your usual perverse small self," declared Jack shrewdly. "I'll bet Hugh didn't weep though--he looks to me as though he could talk to you like a Dutch uncle." "Well I don't care if he did!" said Rosemary. "I'd rather be scolded or punished than cried over. And Aunt Trudy doesn't cry because she is sorry--she does it to get her own way. That's the way she makes us mind--she cries and says we don't love her and that makes us feel mean. "But I don't think it is fair one bit and afterward I'm so mad I could throw a sofa cushion at her. You needn't look at me like that, Jack Welles! Your aunt doesn't cry over _you_." CHAPTER VII THE RUNAWAY June slipped quietly into July and with the long, hot sunny days came the inclination to slight regular tasks as Winnie had predicted. Sarah tried to beg off from making the beds morning after morning and Shirley began to grumble when called from her play to go to the store. Aunt Trudy declared that the heat always affected her and demanded an electric fan in her room and drove Winnie frantic with repeated requests for ice-water. Rosemary alone remained faithful to her duties, feeling the responsibility of an oldest daughter. She answered the many calls on the telephone, kept the messages straight and even wrote out the cards for the office file. Doctor Hugh declared he did not know what he should do without her. When Sarah left her work undone, it was Rosemary who finished it for her, Rosemary who listened sympathetically to Aunt Trudy's complaints about the weather, Rosemary who coaxed Shirley into clean frocks and amiability each afternoon and tried to soothe Winnie when Sarah's side-yard menagerie insisted on invading the house. "Rosemary, this is the second time Shirley has stayed away from lunch," declared Aunt Trudy one noon. "Don't you think I should speak to your brother about it?" "Oh, no, Aunt Trudy, not right away," protested Rosemary, her troubled eyes wandering to the little sister's vacant place. "I don't believe she really means to run away. I'll get her to promise not to go out of the yard and she will be all right. Shirley never broke her promise yet." "Sarah ought to play with her more, instead of fussing with those silly rabbits," said Aunt Trudy severely. "I do play with her," retorted Sarah irritably. "I play with her lots. But she likes Rosemary. I can't help it if she gets mad at me and goes to play with those Bailey children, can I? Rosemary is always practising."