CHAPTER XX
AUNT MINERVA TAKES COMMAND
For an entire week thereafter Aunt Minerva went her own mysterious way, calm and unruffled herself, but keeping the rest of her family on tenter-hooks of excitement.
She wrote mysterious letters which she would allow no one but herself to mail, and received mysterious replies, the contents of which she kept a dark secret. They watched her with the feeling that they were quite outside the game now, and that she had the keys of the situation entirely in her own hands. Which was indeed the truth!
At last one day, after receiving a particularly bulky communication, she deigned to speak.
“Can you carry a message for me to Miss Benedict?” she inquired of Marcia and Janet.
“Yes!” they replied eagerly, but humbly.
“Ask her if she could possibly grant an
