"Johnny is not a bit of a tease," said Sue: "I don't know as he ever tried to tease me in his life; though I tease him once in a great while, when I have what he calls one of my 'high times.'"
"He must be a new kind of a boy if he don't tease," returned Julia: "every boy I ever knew liked to tease, but Felix is the very worst boy to plague any one I ever saw."
Felix laughed, and made up a comic face.
"But you liked to play with him last year, or you wouldn't have hung the blue ribbon out of the window," replied Sue.
"Now, you go and tell every thing! that's just like you!" exclaimed Felix, with a look of vexation.
"He didn't see the blue ribbon very often," replied Julia, laughing. "After he had teased me real hard, I wouldn't play with him for ever so long, and that happened pretty often. I guess he wouldn't have got on very well if it hadn't been for a boy who came up from one of the cottages."
"I wonder if Jack is here this year?" said Felix.
"Yes: I saw him one day down by his cottage, firing pebble-stones at a little kitten he had thrown into the water, to keep her from coming ashore. I stopped the carriage, and told him he ought to be ashamed of himself. Then he let the kitten come ashore; and I got out, and took up the poor, shivering little thing, and brought it home. I saw him a while after, and he accused me of stealing his kitten; but I did not pay any attention to him: I didn't believe a boy had any right to a kitten he wanted to keep just for the sake of treating it cruelly. It's a beautiful little tortoise shell; and he'll never get it again, if I can help it!"
They had all been talking so fast that Johnny, who was always careful not to interrupt, and who never forced himself into notice, had not said a word, except to bow, and say "Good-morning," when he was introduced.
"Why don't you say something, Johnny?" whispered Sue in his ear, as Felix went on talking about Jack, saying he was a pretty good fellow to have a gay time with, and he thought he should look him up before long.