“I don’t see,” moaned he, laying his hand with a gesture of despair on his chest, “I don’t see how such mean things get into my”—he paused, unable to think of the right word—“into my—stomach.”
He meant his heart.
“I’m older’n Lucy is, and I’m a boy. She’s only a girl! I think I was mean, awful mean, mamma!”
It was a great thing for Jimmy to own this.
“Well said, my son! I like that. But you know you are apt to forget. You forgot twice last week to be manly toward Lucy. Is there any way to make you remember?”
Jimmy’s hand, which had been pressed upon his heart, dropped suddenly. He hoped his mother would not think it necessary to punish him very much.
“If—if you don’t let me eat any of that Fourth o’ July Washington-pie, mamma”—
“Certainly I shall forbid the pie at any rate, because you meddled with it. But now for being a coward, and saying, ‘’Twas Lucy;’ what ought we to do about that?”
“O mamma, mamma!” cried Jimmy in alarm, “you wouldn’t take away my fire-crackers and pin-wheels and things?—you wouldn’t do it, mamma?”