“You’ve made me very hot, Natty,” he said. “What is to be done?”
“I don’t know, uncle,” I said dolefully. “But are you very cross with me?”
“Cross, my boy? No. I was only thinking how much you are like my poor sister, your dear mother, who would go into a temper like that sometimes when we were boy and girl.”
“Please, uncle,” I said, laying my hand upon his arm, “I’ll try very hard not to go into a temper again like that.”
“Yes, yes, do, my boy,” he said, taking my hand in his and speaking very affectionately. “Don’t give way to temper, my boy, it’s a bad habit. But I’m not sorry, Nat, I’m not a bit sorry, my dear boy, to see that you’ve got some spirit in you like your poor mother. She was so different to me, Nat. I never had a bit of spirit, and people have always done as they pleased with me.”
I could not help thinking about my aunt just then, but I said nothing, and it was Uncle Joe who began again about the parrot.
“So you think we could not put Humpty Dumpty together again, Nat?”
“No, uncle,” I said despairingly, “I’m sure we could not. It’s all so much lost time.”
“There’s plenty more time to use, Nat, for some things,” he said dreamily, “but not for doing our work, and—and, my boy, after your aunt has let us be out here so much, I’m afraid that I dare not tell her of our failure.”
“Then what’s to be done, uncle?” I said.