"Tell me, Stonie, maybe I can help you decide," said Rose Mary with quick sympathy.
"
It was one of them foolish turkey hens and Tobe sat down on her and a whole nest of most hatched little turkeys. Didn't nobody know she was a-setting in the old wagon but Aunt Amandy, and we was a-climbing into it for a boat on the stormy sea, we was playing like. It was mighty bad on Tobe's pants, too, for he busted all the eggs. Looks like he just always finds some kind of smell and falls in it. I know Mis' Poteet'll be mad at him. And then in a little while here come Aunt Amandy to feed the old turkey, and she 'most cried when she found things so bad all around everywhere. We had runned behind the corn-crib, but when I saw her begin to kinder cry I comed out. Then she asked me did I break up her nest she was a-saving to surprise Uncle Tucker with, and I told her no ma'am I didn't—but I didn't tell her I was with Tobe climbing into the wagon, and it only happened he slid down first on the top of the old turkey. It don't think like to me it was a lie, but it feels like one right here," and
Stonie laid his hand on the pit of his little stomach, which was not far away from the seat of his pain if the modern usage assigned the solar-plexus be correct.
"And did Tobe stay still behind the corn-crib and not come out to tell Aunt Amandy he was sorry he had ruined her turkey nest?" asked Rose Mary, bent on getting all the facts before offering judgment.
"Yes'm, he did, and now he's mighty sorry, cause Tobe loves Aunt Amandy as well as being skeered of the devil. He says if it was Aunt Viney he'd rather the devil would get him right now than tell her, but if you'll come lend him some of my britches he will come in and tell Aunt Amandy about it. He's tooken his off and he has to stay in the corn-crib until I get something for him to put on."
"Of course I'll come get some trousers for Tobe and a clean shirt, too, and I know Aunt Amanda will be glad to forgive him. Tobe is always so nice to her and she'll be sorry he's
sorry, and then it will be all right, won't it?" And thus with a woman's usual shrinking from meeting the question ethical, Rose Mary sought to settle the matter in hand out of court as it were.
"No, Rose Mamie, I ain't sure about that lie yet," asserted the General in a somewhat relieved tone of voice, but still a little uneasy about the moral question involved in the case. "Did I tell it or not? Do you know, Rose Mamie, or will I have to wait till I go to God to find out?"
"Stonie, I really don't know," admitted Rose Mary as she drew the little arguer to her and rested her cheek against the sturdy little shoulder under the patched gingham shirt. "It was not your business to tell on Tobe but—but—please, honey-sweet, let's leave it to God, now. He understands, I'm sure, and some day when you have grown a big and wise man you'll think it all out. When you do, will you tell Rose Mamie?"