" And when she was asked if she could make beef tea, she
replied calmly but decisively, "We sisters are not cooks."
In fact, all that Sister Ambrogia seemed able or willing to do, beyond
the bathing of Amy's face and brushing her hair, which she accomplished
handily, was to sit by the bedside telling her rosary, or plying a
little ebony shuttle in the manufacture of a long strip of tatting. Even
this amount of usefulness was interfered with by the fact that Amy, who
by this time was in a semi-delirious condition, had taken an aversion to
her at the first glance, and was not willing to be left with her for a
single moment.
"I won't stay here alone with Sister Embroidery," she would cry, if her
mother and Katy went into the next room for a moment's rest or a private
consultation; "I hate Sister Embroidery! Come back, mamma, come back
this moment! She's making faces at me, and chattering just like an old
parrot, and I don't understand a word she says. Take Sister Embroidery
away, mamma, I tell you! Don't you hear me? Come back, I say!"
The little voice would be raised to a shrill scream; and Mrs. Ashe and
Katy, hurrying back, would find Amy sitting up on her pillow with wet,
scarlet-flushed cheeks and eyes bright with fever, ready to throw
herself out of bed; while, calm as Mabel, whose curly head lay on the
pillow beside her little mistress, Sister Ambrogia, unaware of the
intricacies of the English language, was placidly telling her beads and
muttering prayers to herself.
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