“No, we can ill spare you, Cob,” said Uncle Dick, “but we should not be doing our duty if we kept you here.”
“Now, uncle,” I cried, “I believe if I went home—though, of course, they would be very glad to see me—my father would say I ought to be ashamed of myself for leaving you three in the lurch.”
“Look here! Look here! Look here!” cried Uncle Bob. “We can’t sit here and be dictated to by this boy. He has run risks enough, and he had better go back to them at once.”
“Oh, you see if I would have said a word if I had known that you would have served me like this!” I cried angrily. “Anyone would think I was a schoolgirl.”
“Instead of a man of sixteen,” said Uncle Bob.
“Never mind,” I cried, “you were sixteen once, Uncle Bob.”
“Quite right, my boy, so I was, and a conceited young rascal I was, almost as cocky as you are.”
“Thank you, uncle.”
“Only I had not been so spoiled by three easy-going, good-natured uncles, who have made you think that you are quite a man.”
“Thank you, uncle,” I said again, meaning to be very sarcastic.