"Can you see?"
"Pretty good."
She drew in a breath of deep and sincere appreciation.
"I got there just in time to see you bite Aleck's ear," she said. "Oh, how he did howl!"
Peter's conscience smote him.
"It ain't—I mean, it isn't fair to bite another fellow's ear," he explained, "but he stuck it in my mouth and I couldn't help it."
"I wish you'd bit off his nose," said Mona. "If I were a boy and had hold of his ear with teeth like yours, I wouldn't let go."
A generous impulse filled Peter's breast. "I'll lick him again tomorrow if you want me to," he offered.
They went up the green slope from the inlet. Peter could hear better than he could see. He could hear the soft croaking of the gulls and the singing of the birds and the steely music of the saw in the mill. His bad eye was toward Mona, so that unless he gave his head a full turn he could not see her at all. A sweaty discomfort possessed him whenever he believed she was making a fresh survey of the disfigurements Aleck had fastened upon him. With his triumph rode the humiliating conviction that his face was out of joint and not pleasant to look at.