"I wouldn't," she said, earnestly. Mamma looked up. "I never would cry for the rain," hastily brushing the moisture from her own cheek. "Ladies don't, nor good children; only cross ones."
"I am glad to hear it," said mamma; but she did not smile.
"It will be pleasant when it clears off, I guess; don't you?"
"It generally is," said mamma, quietly; and then she went on with her work and paid no more attention to Flora. Now that was unusual conduct. What did mamma mean? In thinking about it, Flora forgot her own troubles, and forgot all about the rain, though at that moment it was beating fiercely against the window, and the cold wind was begging to come in. By and by she carried the footstool to her mother's side and seated herself demurely.
"I am going to tell you a story," she said. "It is a story, but it is the truth, too. Want to hear it?"
Mamma assented.
"Well. Once, a good while ago, almost as much as a week, somebody went a-fishing. It wasn't Charley or Bertie or Amy or me. His mother told him never to do it because he might tumble in, you know. But he did; he went."
"What a naughty boy!" said mamma, gravely.
"But he wasn't a boy."
"Excuse me," said mamma, "I thought he was."