They could look out through the branches, and the way the limbs of the tree grew sitting in it was as easy as sitting in a comfortable rocking chair.
“Hello!” called Roger Calendar, leaning out from the tree next to the one where Elizabeth Ann and Doris and Mattie were perched.
“Hello!” Mattie answered. “Did you see your writing that Miss Owen pinned up on the board?”
Roger blushed and ducked behind a convenient branch.
“Are you on a diet, Roger?” Catherine Gould called to him. “Are you afraid you’re getting too fat?”
Catherine sat on the grass, eating her lunch with several of the grammar grade pupils. Catherine never would climb a tree, Mattie whispered to Elizabeth Ann. She said that only boys liked to climb trees.
“Why, I like to climb ’em,” said Elizabeth Ann, meaning the trees. “So does Doris, though she can’t climb a very high tree. Lots of girls like to climb trees.”
“Of course they do,” Mattie agreed. “Catherine only says that, because she doesn’t like to climb trees. And she’s mad because Roger’s writing was the best in the class this morning, and Miss Owen pinned it on the board. When Catherine is mad you can always tell—she says some mean thing.”
“Why—what did she say that was mean?” asked Elizabeth Ann, not understanding.
“Oh, that about asking Roger if he was dieting to keep from getting too fat,” Mattie explained. “Poor Roger gets only two sandwiches for his lunch. He’s almost always hungry. The Bostwicks don’t think he needs much to eat—my mother says they don’t eat much themselves, and they forget when a boy is growing he needs plenty to eat. Roger can eat his lunch in two minutes and it’s mean of Catherine to ask him if he’s afraid of getting fat. He’s the thinnest boy in school now.”