"It's all Ruth's fault!" Lionel cried vindictively. "She's such a chatterbox, and repeats everything she hears! She hasn't found out that I've got the powder and shot, thank goodness! We'll fire off the blunderbuss in spite of her!"
"But Aunt Arabella said we were not to!" Dick objected, amazed that his cousin should contemplate such an act of deliberate disobedience, for he had been taught himself that to obey those set in authority over him was his plain duty in life.
"I know she said so," Lionel acknowledged with a frown, "but I mean to do as I like. We'll take the blunderbuss a long distance from the house, far away into the woods, and mother will never know whether we've been firing it or not!"
"Oh, Lionel! you don't mean it—you can't! It would be awfully wrong! And if she doesn't know we've disobeyed her, God will! Oh, you don't mean to be so wicked as that!"
"You miserable little coward!" Lionel cried irately. "What a funk you're in! Now it's coming to the point you're afraid to fire off the blunderbuss, I suppose!"
"No, I'm not," Dick replied, his eyes flashing angrily at this taunt; "but I'm not going to disobey Aunt Arabella. I won't go with you—there! I know what father would say about it!"
"Oh, do you? What, then?"
"That it's our duty to obey Aunt Arabella! I'm certain he'd think so! Father says the first lesson a soldier has to learn is to obey, and I'm going to be a soldier when I'm a man! I'm not a miserable little coward, and I dare you to say it!"
Dick was vastly indignant. As usual when deeply moved he had turned very pale.
Lionel glanced at him doubtfully, longing to box his ears soundly, and "put the youngster in his place," as he mentally expressed it; but he remembered the first occasion on which he and his cousin had met, and recalled the swift blow which had proved to him far more effectually than any words would have done, that Dick had a temper which it was unwise to rouse. Except for that one disagreement, the boys had been excellent friends until this moment, simply because Lionel had refrained from disparaging those Dick loved, and Dick had allowed him to take the lead in every way. Now it was a question of right and wrong, the younger boy refused to be led. He never for a moment hesitated, but flatly declined to join in an act of disobedience.