"You? Oh, I don't know. Perhaps so," I reply, with unpleasant truthfulness.
Marmaduke removes his arm from around me and frowns.
"You are candor itself," he says, with a slight tinge of bitterness. "Certainly I can never hereafter accuse you of having concealed the true state of your feelings towards me. Whatever else you may be, you are honest."
"I am," I return reluctantly; "I wish I were not. I am always saying the wrong thing, and repenting it afterwards. Papa says my candor makes me downright vulgar. Marmaduke, do you think honesty is the best policy?"
I glance up at him with questioning eyes from under the flapping hat that has braved so many summers.
"I do," he answers, warmly; "I think there is nothing on earth so sweet or so rare as perfect truthfulness. Be open and true and honest, darling, and like yourself as long as you can. Every hour you live will make the role more difficult."
"But why? You are older than I am, Marmaduke; would you tell a lie?"
"No, not a direct lie, perhaps, but I might pretend to what I did not feel."
"Oh, but that is nothing. I would do that myself," I exclaim, confidentially. "Many and many a time I have pretended not to know where Billy was when I knew papa was going to box his ears. There is no great harm in that. And Billy has done it for me."
"You don't mean to say Mr. Vernon ever boxed your ears?"