Mrs. Creddle's cautious advice.

All that, however, was long ago. Now--demure and slim--Caroline would
no more have thought of racing round half-built houses at night than
Mrs. Creddle herself. But she flung open the front door of Number 10
with the same certainty of warm interest she had always felt on
entering that house, for Mrs. Creddle might be "put out," unhappy,
anxious--but never coldly indifferent.

"Aunt!" called Caroline from the foot of the stairs in the excited
voice which she strove to keep calm.

Mrs. Creddle emerged from a bedroom, with her usual air of being a
little too warm, whatever the weather, and her clear-skinned, jolly
face a little perturbed. "What's the matter, Carrie? You know Miss
Ethel's expecting you. You ought to be there by now."

Caroline drew back a pace, then let her missile fly. "I aren't----"
But even in this stress of emotion she paused from force of habit to
correct her speech--"I'm not going to Miss Wilson's."

"What!" Mrs. Creddle came down the stairs with the peculiar buoyancy
of active stout people. "I've just sent your box. Whatever are you
talking about, Carrie?"

"I met Mr. Brook--he's the one that has to do with the Amusements
Committee: and he said if I applied for Maggie Wake's job, I should get
it. They want somebody steady and respectable that knows how to
behave."

"But you can't apply for it!" said Mrs. Creddle, breathing sharply as
if from the impact of an actual blow. "You've promised for years to go
to Miss Wilson's when Ellen left, and they've waited for you ever since
November. You _can't_ behave like this to them now, Carrie. I can
understand your being tempted, but you can't do it. You promised
faithful."

"No, I didn't," said Caroline. "I never promised anything. It was you
that promised for me. And I always hated the thought of living in, and
being tied up at nights in their old kitchen; only you and Aunt Ellen
fixed it all up when I was a kid, and I somehow never thought of going
against you. It seemed one of the things that had to be--like putting
your hair up and such like--but I never wanted to do it my own self."

"Well, you can't run back now," said Mrs. Creddle. "After all that
Miss Ethel and Mrs. Bradford have done for us in the past, I should be
ashamed to think of such a thing. Why, this very dress I have on came
from Mrs. Bradford, and your blouse was made from a print skirt of Miss
Ethel's. And when you had whoopin