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 "Oh, I'm not going to tell him for a while," said Mother, anxiously. "I'm going to wait. He may not like the idea, just at first; but I'm sure her influence will be good and—"

Gee! That was enough! I didn't care how much Dad "settled" with me; but when it came to the girl and her "influence"—I lit out over the veranda rail.

It's queer how hard it is to think when anything big and horrid walks up to you. All you seem to be able to do is to sit and stare, with your mind, at the thing, and watch it make faces at you. I couldn't think at all that afternoon, for more than half an hour; and then the first thing that really came to me was what a fool I had been to come out to the sweet-apple tree when I was feeling that way. Up to then the sweet-apple tree had always meant fun; and when at last I rolled over in the long grass and wiped the perspiration off of my cheeks with my sleeve, and looked up in the branches and—noticed that one of the cleats leading to the crow's-nest was loose; just then it came to me that I had been and spoiled the tree by coming there with something that hurt;—and Bess was coming home that night, too. I rolled