"But I could tell in a holy minute if I should go up there—"
"Sube!" his father glared at him dangerously. "You are positively forbidden to go anywhere near that cemetery for the next six months! If you do,—I will turn you over to the authorities, and let the law take its course. Don't forget that! I mean it!—And now, you may go to bed just as fast as you can get there."
"But I want to tell you some'pm—"
"I don't care to hear another word. I've heard quite enough for one night. Go—to—bed!"
As Sube dragged himself unwillingly up the stairs, Mrs. Cane said to her husband:
"Well, at last the tide has turned. Sube has discovered the truth."
"Huh! I must say he picked out a fine time to discover it," was her husband's grim rejoinder. "Why, if Mrs. Hotchkiss-Harger should believe I ever did such a thing as rob a cemetery of its shrubbery, she'd never trust me again—and besides, I'd die of shame and mortification."
"Well," comforted Mrs. Cane, "in the first place, she'd never believe such a thing. And in the next place, what does an old evergreen tree amount to compared with the truth? I must admit that I was somewhat surprised to see you trying to lead your own son into evasion when he was doing his best to tell the truth."
Next day, with an armful of packages Nancy Guilford ascended the Canes' front porch and rang the doorbell. And as Annie was stuffing the turkey Mrs. Cane herself opened the door.