After school and on Saturdays there was always the daily walk, and there were lessons, all kinds of lessons—piano lessons of course, and nature-study lessons out of an excellent book Aunt Frances had bought, and painting lessons, and sewing lessons, and even a little French, although Aunt Frances was not very sure about her own pronunciation. She wanted to give the little girl every possible advantage, you see. They were really inseparable. Elizabeth Ann once said to some ladies calling on her aunts that whenever anything happened in school, the first thing she thought of was what Aunt Frances would think of it. “Why is that?” they asked, looking at Aunt Frances, who was blushing with pleasure. “Oh, she is so interested in my school work! And she UNDERSTANDS me!” said Elizabeth Ann, repeating the phrases she had heard so often. Aunt Frances’s eyes filled with happy tears. She called Elizabeth Ann to her and kissed her and gave her as big a hug as her thin arms could manage. Elizabeth Ann was growing tall very fast. One of the visiting ladies said that before long she would be as big as her auntie, and a troublesome young lady. Aunt Frances said: “I have had her from the time she was a little baby and there has scarcely been an hour she has been out of my sight. I’ll always have her confidence. You’ll always tell Aunt Frances EVERYTHING, won’t you, darling?” Elizabeth Ann resolved to do this always, even if, as now, she often had to invent things to tell. Aunt Frances went on, to the callers: “But I do wish she weren’t so thin and pale and nervous. I suppose it is the exciting modern life that is so bad for children. I try to see that she has plenty of fresh air. I go out with her for a walk every single day. But we have taken all the walks around here so often that we’re rather tired of them. It’s often hard to know how to get her out enough. I think I’ll have to get the doctor to come and see her and perhaps give her a tonic.” To Elizabeth Ann she added, hastily: “Now don’t go getting notions in your head, darling. Aunt Frances doesn’t think there’s anything VERY much the matter with you. You’ll be all right again soon if you just take the doctor’s medicine nicely. Aunt Frances will take care of her precious little girl. SHE’ll make the bad sickness go away.” Elizabeth Ann, who had not known before that she was sick, had a picture of herself lying in the little white coffin, all covered over with white.... In a few minutes Aunt Frances was obliged to excuse herself from her callers and devote herself entirely to taking care of Elizabeth Ann.