Mary looked doubtful.
“I was a goose to tell you, though, Flaxie; I might have known girls always make a fuss.”
“Oh, it isn’t because I’m a girl, Fred! Girls like fun as well as anybody, only girls have more——.” She did not know whether to say “delicacy” or “discretion,” but decided that either word would give offence; “girls are different.”
“Then you won’t go with me? No matter. I believe, after all, I’d rather have one of the boys.”
“Yes, oh yes, I will go with you; I’d like to go,” exclaimed Mary, desperately, throwing discretion to the winds.
“Agreed, then,—to-morrow morning on the way to school. And now mind, Flaxie, don’t put this down in your journal to-night, for that would let it all out.”
“Why, nobody ever looks at my journal! It would be dishonest.—Why, Fred,” in sudden alarm, “did you ever look at my journal?”
“Poh! what do I care for your old scribblings?” The boy’s manners had been falling to decay all winter for lack of his mother’s constant “line upon line.” “Only your journal is always ’round, and you’d better be careful, that’s all.”