“‘Good tidings every day,
God’s messengers ride fast.’”
repeated Tessa.
“Tessa,” with her face turned away, “do you like Gus very much?”
“Do I like you very much? I should just as soon think of your asking me that.”
“Better than Felix or Mr. Towne or Dr. Lake, or any of the ten thousand young men in Dunellen?”
“Why, Dine, what ails you? Are you asking my advice? He hasn’t been making love to my little sister, has he?”
“No,” said Dinah, “I wonder if he knows how. Daisy Grey’s father is dead. There will have to be a new Greek professor at the Seminary. She liked her father.”
XII.—GOOD ENOUGH TO BE TRUE.
The afternoon sun was shining down hot on the head of the soldier on his tall pedestal in the Park; he stood leaning on his gun, his eyes intently peering from under the broad visor of his cap; at his feet a group of children were playing soldiers marching to the war; at the pump, several yards distant, a small boy was pumping for the others to drink, a tall boy was lifting the rusty dipper to his lips while a ragged little girl was wistfully awaiting her turn; nurses in white caps were rolling infants’ chaises along the smooth, wide paths; ladies in shopping attire were sauntering with brown parcels in their hands; half-grown boys were lolling on the green benches with cigars and lazy words in their mouths; girls in twos and threes were strolling along with linked arms mingling gay talk with gay laughter; in the arbor seven little girls and three little boys were playing school: a little boy who stammered was trying to spell Con-stan-ti-no-ple, a rosy child in white was noisily repeating “Thirty days hath September,” a black-eyed boy was shouting “The boy stood on the burning deck,” and a naughty child was being vigorously scolded by the teacher, who held a threatening willow switch above her head. “You are the dreadfulest child that ever breathed,” she was declaring. “You are the essence of stupidity, you are the dumbest of the dumb.”
A serious voice arrested the willow switch: “I didn’t like to be scolded when I was a little girl, it used to make me cry.”