Possibly this withering remark hit Andrew harder than her small fists could have done.
Phil and Jack greeted this statement with a roar of approving laughter, which Andrew, happily, did not see fit to resent.
Clearly his recent chastisement had made him, temporarily, a wiser, as well as a sadder boy.
CHAPTER VIII
Ogres.
FOR the next quarter of an hour, perhaps, certainly no longer, comparative calm reigned amongst the little party.
But the spirit of discord having once broken bounds in their midst, the happy peace of that glorious summer afternoon, which might have worn away so merrily, was gone, and sad to say, wrangling soon began again. First of all, Di, bent on being idle herself, took to teasing Phoena. The latter was trying to read, but Di confiscated her book. Then she ridiculed Fay, who was making a knock-about frock for Marygold’s big doll to wear in the hayfields. Meanwhile Phil and Jack decided to give Hubert a lesson in tree-climbing, and though they began their instructions with the best intentions, they soon started teazing him when he showed himself somewhat unamenable to their orders.
“Look here,” said Phil, indicating a very inaccessible limb of a birch tree, “you’re a regular little molly, but you’ll have to climb up to that branch and ride-a-cock-horse on it before we’ve done with you.”
“But I’ll tumble down, I know I will,” said Hubert, with an amount of caution which his six years made very excusable.
“Well, and if you do tumble down, and if you do break your precious little neck—”
“But I’ll be deaded then,” shrieked Hubert.