Ben bit a large semicircle out of a biscuit, and said through the crumbs:
“The trees is just a breakin’ with ’em. I went to a mulberry this mornin’, and th’was sixty odd on one limb!”
“Why, Ben,” said father, looking up, “that couldn’t have been so.”
“Well, they mightn’t a’ been; but three hundred and over ran outen the tree when I shot.”
Ben is not the only one I have met whose stories grew bigger as they repeated them.
Mrs. Bemby now interrupted him.
“Ben, you talked mighty nigh enough. Let somebody else have a mouth.”
Ben, thus rebuked, was silent, and father and Mr. B—— talked about the farm, while Carlotta and Lulie occasionally whispered, and I ate in silence.
After the meal the Bembys left for their house, Ben having promised to take me hunting and fishing in all the best places; and we went out to the front porch to talk over our plans for pleasure. Father went to the library to read, mother was resting in her room, nobody in the porch but Carlotta, Lulie and I; and again I felt that Carlotta was in the way.