Page:Stringer - Lonely O'Malley.djvu/248

 "Was she scared—much?" somebody demanded.

"Scared! She had to be shut up in a dark room, with wet towels and things, to keep from gettin' softenin' of the brain!"

"Tell us another story," said Lulu Bird.

"Who 's tellin' stories?" demanded the indignant Lonely. And as Lionel Clarence came panting up at that moment; the Plutarch of Cowansburg turned his attention to more fitting company.

"Whew! She does pull!" cried the envious Preacher's son, as he took the taut and humming line in his hand.

Lonely modestly confessed that it wasn't altogether a slouch of a kite.

"Won't you tell us another story?" reiterated Lulu Bird, patiently, as the three girls sat down and spread out their skirts about Lonely.

A look passed between the two boys, telepathic, fleeting, and yet eloquent.

"You might as well," said one look.

"What 's the use?" said the other. "Tell them about the time that she-lion got loose in Cowansburg," suggested Lionel Clarence, to whom the tale had been graphically