"No, we ain't. He'll run off and so she won't ask him questions."
"But she'll _think_ it's him. It'll be mean."
"No it won't."
"It's mean to have somebody else take your blame or your punishment;
mamma said so."
The small casuist was too discreet to attack Johnny's oracle; she only
pouted her pretty lips and quibbled:
"'Tain't mean if the people who get blamed are mean themselves--like
him. I don't care _how_ blamed he gets; I wouldn't care if he got
licked."
But Johnny's conscience was not so elastic. "I don't care, either," he
protested. "I--I wouldn't care if he was _deaded_"--anxious to
propitiate--"but it would be mean just the same. I got to tell papa,
Peggy, I truly have."
Peggy grew very cross. "You are just the foolest, obsternatest little
boy I ever did see," she grumbled; "you're a plumb idiot! I'd like to
slap you! Your papa'll be awful mad."
Johnny-Ivan essayed an indifferent mien, but his eyes were miserable.
"Say, Jo'nivan,"--her voice sank to a whisper that curdled his
blood--"were you ever spanked?"
"Only Hilma sorter kinder--not really _spanking_, you know," confessed
Johnny with a toss of his head.
Pages:
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132