‘Of course I didn’t,’ said Micky; ‘gentlemen never drink their guest’s—I mean their adopted children’s—milk, and, besides, I don’t like milk much. But I’m going to have a biscuit, anyhow.’
‘But, Micky, it’s just as bad for a gentleman to eat his adopted child’s biscuit as to drink his milk,’ said Emmeline.
‘No, it’s not; not when the gentleman’s been swarming up water-pipes till he’s as hungry as hungry,’ said Micky. ‘I tell you what, Emmeline, if you’ll let me have the other two biscuits, I’ll go and tell Aunt Grace I’m very sorry I’ve had an accident and broken two of the glasses. Then there won’t be any questions asked. Aunt Grace is much too jolly to bother you with questions when you go and tell of yourself.’
‘It doesn’t seem quite truthful, somehow,’ said Emmeline. ‘She’ll think you’ve been dropping the glasses on the floor or something like that.’
‘Well, I shan’t say so,’ said Micky stoutly, ‘and I did have an accident—several accidents.’
‘I suppose it’s all right,’ said Emmeline, still rather doubtfully; ‘and if you must have the biscuits, you must, but it’s rather horrid of you, Micky.’
‘No, it’s not horrid, it’s only hungry of me,’ said Micky, calmly helping himself to a biscuit; ‘you must remember I’ve got a long night before me.’
Micky did not have to go downstairs to make his confession to Aunt Grace, for she appeared in the schoolroom while he was in the middle of his second biscuit.
‘Why, Micky, you seem to be having a very lengthy supper to-night,’ she remarked, in her brisk, pleasant voice. ‘Do you know half-past eight has struck? And what has been happening to the glasses?’ she added, coming to the table and examining them.
‘I’ve had—several accidents,’ stammered Micky, turning red.