"How nice to meet you!" Sidney cried. "Where have you been?"
"I've been tramping off my temper," Monica replied stolidly.
Sidney's merry laugh rippled out.
"How delicious! I've come out on pretty much the same errand, only it is a fit of the blues, not temper, which I wish to get rid of. You're not going back yet!"
"I'll turn and walk a bit farther with you. I've had a rasping day, and that imp Chuckles is at the bottom of it. You know I'm having some new pigsties built; well, one was finished this morning, or pretty nearly—the masons had done their part and gone. What did that child do but deliberately slip out in the driving storm and demolish the whole building. How he did it I don't know; he kicked and beat and tore the bricks off one after the other. I caught him standing in the ruins. He seemed beside himself with exultation. He yelled when he saw me:
"'It hadn't a funation, Aunt Monnie; Higgs wouldn't build it on a piece of rock, and so, of course, it has all come down with a crash. The wind and storm and me didded it altogether! I telled Higgs he would find it all gone away! He'll have to build another on a rock!'
"I was so exasperated that I did not argue the point with him, but gave him bread and water for his dinner for that piece of deliberate mischief. I left him to Aunt Dannie for the afternoon, and then, as I discovered the sheep had escaped out of their proper field, I thought to myself that he might like to help me drive them back. He never bears malice—that's one of his good points—and I hate being out of friends with him. So I went indoors and called him. He was in an arm-chair by the dining-room fire, drawing with pencil and paper. Aunt Dannie was opposite, nodding off to sleep. When he heard why I wanted him, he looked up calmly:
"'No, fanks; I'm more comfable here.'
"Then my anger rose, for I am determined to bring him up hardily.
"'You'll come out at once,' I said, 'or go straight to bed. I'm not going to have you turn into a little mollycoddle, sitting by the fire and letting your aunt go out in the rain. A man would be ashamed to do such a thing.'