CHAPTER XVII.
BETTY'S BRAVERY.
"Celia, I've notion that we ought to give Ben something. A sort of peace-offering, you know; for he feels dreadfully hurt about our suspecting him," said Thorny, at dinner that day.
"I see he does, though he tries to seem as bright and pleasant as ever. I do not wonder, and I've been thinking what I could do to soothe his feelings. Can you suggest anything?"
"Cuff-buttons. I saw some jolly ones over at Berryville,—oxidized silver, with dogs' heads on them, yellow eyes, and all as natural as could be. Those, now, would just suit him for his go-to-meeting white shirts,—neat, appropriate, and in memoriam."
Miss Celia could not help laughing, it was such a boyish suggestion; but she agreed to it, thinking Thorny knew best, and hoping the yellow-eyed dogs would be as balm to Ben's wounds.
"Well, dear, you may give those, and Lita shall give the little whip with a horse's foot for a handle, if it is not gone. I saw it at the harness shop in town, and Ben admired it so much that I planned to give it to him on his birthday."
"That will tickle him immensely; and if you'd just let him put brown tops to my old boots and stick a cockade in his hat when he sits up behind the phaeton, he'd be a happy fellow!" laughed Thorny, who had discovered that one of Ben's ambitions was to be a "tip-top groom."
"No, thank you; those things are out of place in America, and would be absurd in a small country place like this. His blue suit and straw hat please me better for a boy, though a nicer little groom, in livery or out, no one could desire, and you may tell him I said so."
"I will, and he'll look as proud as Punch; for he thinks every word you say worth a dozen from any one else. But wont you give him something? Just some little trifle, to show that we are both eating humble pie, feeling sorry about the mouse money."