made for the comfortable pillowing of little children. While she was about, no harm, spiritual or physical, could come to any young thing, and if she and her children did make hash of grammar and manners, well, that could be remedied, Alice considered with stoicism.
So it was that Alice welcomed any diversion from Tobeys', which, it appeared, was her fat neighbor's name. The first diversion that offered was a little boy who with his mother was boarding in an adjoining cottage. He was an enviably neat little boy, a city-bred child of good manners. He hopped up promptly from chairs; he said, "Yes, Mrs. Marcey," and, "No, Mrs. Marcey," instead of bawling "Yep" and "Nope," after the manner of Tobeys. Nor did his cheeks, like the Tobey cheeks, bulge perpetually with "all day suckers."
Alice fondly imagined it was Robert's better nature which drew him to this well-behaved youngster.
Presently why it was that Robert found this child so fascinating came to Alice. She found out through Sara.
"Ah, ha!" Sara cried. "Ah, ha! Robert Marcey, I am going to tell Mother!"
"Go and tell," Robert returned. "Go and tell, be-a cause you can't."
"Oh, yes, I can," chirped Sara. "Oh, yes, I can, and I am going to tell, because you won't tell me, and that's why! An' I know why you won't tell me. Because it's bad things, that's why you won't tell me, Robert Marcey."
"Tittle-tattle, tittle-tattle," Robert retorted. He said this, his mother observed from behind the screening vines, on all fours, while with an imitation of a balking mule he flourished his heels at Sara, and for additional insult he went "he-haw, he-haw." This was another of the mysteries that crowded around Alice, for Robert had
