‘He liked you better than anyone,’ says he, in his slow, ponderous fashion, glaring angrily at Betty, with whom he carries on an undying feud. ‘Why, don’t you remember how he used to hunt you all over the garden to kiss you!’
Tableau!
Betty leads the way after about a moment’s awful pause, and then they all go off into shrieks of laughter. Jacky, alone, sullen, silent, not understanding, stands as if petrified. Susan has pushed Bonnie from her, and has risen to her feet. Her face is crimson now; her eyes are full of tears. Involuntarily Crosby rises too.
‘He used not,’ says poor Susan. Alas! this assertion is not quite true. ‘And even if he did, you’—to the horrified Jacky—‘should not have told it. You, Jacky’—trembling with shame—‘I wouldn’t have believed it of you! It was hateful of you! You’—with a withering glance around—‘are all hateful, and—and—’
She chokes, breaks down, and runs with swift-flying feet into the small shrubbery beyond, where lies a little summer-house in which she can hide herself.
CHAPTER XXIII.
‘Tears are often to be found where there is little sorrow.’
An embarrassed silence falls upon the group she leaves behind her. It had not occurred to them that she would care so much. They had often chaffed her before. It must—it must have been Mr. Crosby’s being there that had put her out like that. To tell the truth, they are all penitent—Betty perhaps more than the others. But even her remorse sinks into insignificance before Jacky’s. His takes the nature of a wrathful attack upon the others, and ends in a storm of tears.
‘You’ve been teasing her, you know you have—and she’s mad with me now. And I didn’t mean anything. And she’s crying, I know she is. And you’re all beasts—beasts!’
It is at this point that his own tears break forth, and, like Susan, he flees from them—but, unlike Susan, howling.