The boy had not attended boarding school for nothing. With an heroic effort he mastered himself.
“Nothing. Something caught me in the throat. By the way, I’m fourteen now; have been since last June. It’s time for me to get busy and fix up the religious question.”
“Oh, that’s all right,” said Dora, turning shining eyes and the glowing face of enthusiasm upon her new friend. “I’ll instruct you in the Catholic faith myself.”
“But I don’t intend to be a Catholic. It isn’t up-to-date. There’s too much superstition in it.”
Dora’s eyes opened to their widest.
“Clarence, how can you talk so? I’m shocked. You need instruction badly, and I’m going to begin tomorrow.”
They certainly at this moment looked like life-long friends. Dora, once the question of religion had been raised, had become intensely earnest. Master Ezra, the boat repairing being fairly completed, had drawn near enough to see their faces without being able to catch the exact import of their words. He was plainly disquieted. Tiptoeing his way behind the trees he stole behind the two controversialists, and seizing the end of the log on which they were sitting, gave it a shove and a kick, with the result that the two fell sprawling to the earth.
Clarence was up at once, and with a courtly air caught the girl’s hand and helped her to her feet.
“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Ezra. His voice was raucous.
“My friend,” said Clarence. “I’m not at all pleased with that laugh of yours.”