“Tell them to go on away,” he bellowed. “It’s an accident; can’t you see it’s an accident that happened behind my back when I wasn’t looking and how could I help it if it got caught when I wasn’t there and didn’t know anything about it——”
“Oh, I think it’s just gorgeous, Else,” caroled Olga Wetherson. “How did you ever think——”
“Go on to school!” the hero thundered, “and let that alone. Don’t you know accidents can happen to—to—even to the most—the smartest people? Don’t you know that that isn’t supposed to be there on purpose?”
This was shouted for the benefit of his mother and sister and intimated his line of defense. But Elsie heard him not. One horrified glance and she had withdrawn from the window and buried her face in the pillows of the bed, clenching her hands and weeping copiously.
“Walter,” called his mother, “you come in the house at once.”
“Do you blame me for something that happened when I wasn’t there?” he shouted. “Do you say I’m to blame for something that happened behind my back? Gee whiz, do you call that logic? Hey, Billy Wessels, you’re in the senior class, gee whiz, is that logic—what happened behind my back when I wasn’t there to stop it? Can I be in two places at once?”
“Walter, you come down out of that tree and come in the house at once.”
“Do you say I’m to blame?” he roared.
“I say for you to leave whatever you’re doing and come in the house—at once.”
“Gee whiz.”