'O Lance!' entreated Cherry; 'no waste—think of Wilmet and the bills.'
'We'll eat it every bit up,' asseverated Lance; but Fulbert growled, 'If you bother any more, I shall crumble the whole lot out at window.'
'It is wicked to waste bread,' lisped Angela, and Martha at that moment appeared to fetch the tureen for the kitchen dinner.
'Can't you eat any more, Cherry?' asked Felix gloomily.
'Not a bit, thank you,' she said.
'We've not done!' shouted the boys, seizing on her scarcely-tasted and half-cold plate.
'You must finish after. Come, Cherry!' Then, as they left the room, and she laid her head on his shoulder—'Little ruffians!' he said under his breath.
'Oh, never mind, Felix. I don't—at least I ought not to mind—they don't mean it.'
'Lance does not, but I think Fulbert does. He'll make me thrash him within two inches of his life, before he has done. And then there's no one to take me in hand for it. It is horridly bad for them, too, to live just like young bears.'
But he smoothed his brow as he came into the room where his mother was, and amused her till his time was up.