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Rh the honour and glory of the undertaking, and eats the fish afterwards.

"No, you little silly, I don't! It's something much better. Can you keep a secret?" (holding my arm tight).

"Of course I can!" I say indignantly; and, extraordinary as such an assertion may appear from a female, I can.

"Well," says Jack deliberately, "if you're not nervous, you know, or squeamish, like other girls, I'll take you with me; but you must not call out or scream, or anything of that kind, or we shall be caught, and there will be a shine in the tents of Shem."

"I won't scream," I say eagerly; "and you know I am not a bit like a real girl. You always say I am more than half a boy."

"I'm going," says Jack, eyeing me closely, "to see a pig killed."

"A pig?—oh, Jack!—you don't mean it! They squeak so dreadfully! I'm sure it must hurt them very much!"

"Nonsense!" says Jack philosophically. "They are noisy brutes, and always make a fearful row over everything: besides it's a very good thing they do squeak; for, if you happened to be frightened and called out, you know—for you are only a girl—the men would think it was the pig, not you."

"Oh!" I say dubiously, for the idea that my voice cannot be mistaken from that of an expiring pig has not before occurred to me.

"The fact is, Nell," says Jack, glancing sharply at my face "you're afraid, and I didn't think it of you—no, I didn't. However, I'll let you have till to-morrow to think it over; and if, when I throw a handful of gravel up at your window at five o'clock, you are not dressed and ready, I shall know you are a coward."

"No you won't," I say, rebelling against this injustice, "if I don't go it won't be because I am afraid, but because I don't want to see the—the—mess."

"Make up your mind one way or the other," says Jack care-