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Rh “Tell me now, Addie, why you fought with Jaap.”

“Oh, a boys’ quarrel, Mamma, about nothing, really, about nothing at all! Jaap was tormenting a cat; and I can’t stand that. Give me a kiss, Mamma.”

He kissed his mother very earnestly, embraced her in his clutching arms. He would have forgiven her everything, if it had been really so, if he had been the son of an Italian; but it would have been an everlasting grief to him if he had not been his father’s son. . ..