“I got it for you,” he whispered, with another glance at the office door. Anderson recognized, with the dismay of a collector, a fine specimen, which he had sought in vain, made utterly worthless by ruthless handling, but he controlled himself. “Thank you,” he said, and took the poor, despoiled beauty and laid it carefully on the table.
“It got broke a little, somehow,” remarked the boy; “it's wings are awful brittle.”
“Yes, they are,” assented Anderson.
“I had to chase it quite a spell,” said the boy, with an evident desire not to have his efforts underestimated.
“Yes, I don't doubt it,” replied Anderson, with gratitude well simulated.
“It seemed rather a pity to kill such a pretty butterfly as that,” remarked the boy, unexpectedly, “but I thought you'd like it.”
“Yes, I like to have a nice collection of butterflies,” replied Anderson, with a faint inflection of apology. In reality, the butterflies' side of it had failed to occur to him before, and he felt that an appeal to science in such a case was rather feeble. Then the boy helped him out.
“Well,” said he, “I do suppose that a butterfly don't live very long, anyhow; he has to die pretty soon, and it's better for human beings to have him stuck on a pin and put where they can see how handsome he is, rather than have him stay out in the fields, where the rain would soak him into the ground, and that would be the end of him. I suppose it is better to save anything that's pretty, somehow, even if the thing don't like it himself.”
“Perhaps you are right,” replied Anderson, regarding the boy with some wonder.
“Maybe he didn't mind dying 'cause I caught him any more than just dying himself,” said Eddy.