“Oh, I hope you never did that,” said Cousin Prudence.
“Sure I didn’t,” Pee-wee assured her.
If any proof of his courage was required, he gave it in his martial advance up the wide, old-fashioned, thickly carpeted stairway which led to the inner fortress where Aunt Sophia Primshock sat bundled up in a big wheel chair. No weapon had she but her spectacles, but she used those in such a way as to make her terrible to behold. Her eyes made sudden flank movements around the side of them; they went “over the top” as well; and peered straight through them in a way of terrible scrutiny.
Aunt Sophia Primshock had all kinds of money and several different kinds of rheumatism. As fast as there was a new kind, she secured it. She was very deaf, but not too deaf to hear Pee-wee. It was not quite as bad as that. Next to her collection of rheumatics was her collection of cats. In the august presence Pee-wee now appeared in all his scout glory—marred only by a hole in his stocking—followed by Cousin Prudence.
“I am very glad to see my nephew,” said Aunt Sophia, as Pee-wee advanced to receive her kiss, “and I am not only glad but proud to call him my nephew,” she added. “I don’t know much about this scouting, I’m afraid it makes boys a little wild. But when a boy registers his friendship for dumb creatures I am proud, more than proud, to call him my nephew. You have seen the girl’s committee? They are dear, sweet girls, all of them.”
“Oh yes, he fell for us, Mother,” said Prudence.
“Fell for you?”
“Yes, he fell all over himself, but he isn’t hurt.”
“And what is better still, he would not inflict any hurt,” said Aunt Sophia. “And what a fine boy he is, eh Prudence? A splendid, kind, humane boy, with a heart—”
“On his left side, Mother,” said Prudence; “he proved it to us and we know he has a heart.”