"What for made you give me gum, then, to shut up?" she inquired. Robert blushed a dark red. "He's mad with me, but he's not mad with me about gum." She turned a maddening glance on Robert. "He's mad because I get his goat!"
At this Robert flounced out of the room and Sara ran after him calling loudly:
"Robert—Robert! I didn't mean it. Honest, I didn't mean it!"
Mrs. Marcey had let a heavy and portentous silence fall in the room, and then said, with the air of one making the remark for the first time:
"Steps have got to be taken. Sara's character is becoming disintegrated. When a child of Sara's age darts out her tongue at her brother as naturally as a serpent, chews gum and lurks around her Grandma's house for the purpose of acquiring three gray hairs to burn, and later explains it's because she wants the Witch of Endor—whatever she may mean by that—and then says vulgar things about goats, I should think you could see for yourself that it is time for a tighter rein or at least a proper governess."
