"Rob, let Nelly speak first: ladies before gentlemen, always." And the impatient Rob reluctantly kept silent while Nelly told the tale.
Mrs. March's face grew sad as the story went on. It was a terrible thing to her to think of her little daughter attacked in the street in that way by rude boys.
"Now, oughtn't I to have thrashed them, mamma?" cried Rob, encouraged by the indignation in his mother's face: "oughtn't I to? But Nell she just pulled me into the store by main force; and I felt so mean. I felt as if I looked just like Trotter when he puts his tail between his legs and runs away from a big dog. I don't care: I'll thrash that ugly black-eyed boy yet,—the one that spoke to Nelly; sha'n't I, mamma? Wouldn't you? I know you would! And mayn't I wear the yoke again, just to show them I ain't afraid?"
"Keep cool, Rob," said Mrs. March; "keep cool!"
"I can't keep cool, mamma," said Rob, almost crying; "and you couldn't, either,—you know you couldn't!"
"Perhaps not, dear; but I'd try," replied his mother. "Nothing else does any good ever."
"Well, mayn't I wear the yoke, anyhow?" said Rob. "I won't go into Rosita ever again unless I can!"
"Rob," said his mother, earnestly, "if you were going across a field where there was a bull, you wouldn't wear a red cloak: would you? It would be very silly, wouldn't it?"
"Yes," said Rob, slowly and very reluctantly. He saw what his mother meant.
"That's just what I said," interrupted Nelly: "I said it would be very silly to wear them any more. The boys would never let us alone if we did."