"I am charmed with the improved tone of her letters, and am delighted to see by them that even under your grave regimen she has not lost her old buoyancy of spirits. My dear Johns, I owe you a debt in this matter which I shall never be able to repay. Kiss the little witch for me; tell her that 'Papa' always thinks of her, as he sits solitary upon the green bench under the arbor. God bless the dear one, and keep all trouble from her!"
She, gaining in height now month by month, wins more and more upon the grave Doctor,—wins upon Rose, who loves her as she loves her sisters,—wins upon Phil, whose liking for her is becoming demonstrative to a degree that prompts a little jealousy in the warm-blooded Reuben, and that drives out all thought of the pink cheeks and fat arms of Suke Boody. Miss Johns still regards her with admiring eyes, and shows all her old assiduity in looking after her comforts and silken trappings. Day after day, in summer weather, Rose and she idle together along the embowered paths of the village; the Tew partners greet the pair with smiles; good Mistress Elderkin has always a cordial welcome; the stout Squire stoops to kiss the little Jesuit, who blushes at the tender affront through all the brownness of her cheek, like a rose. Day after day the rumble of the mill breaks on the country quietude; and as autumn comes in, burning with all its forest fires, the farmer's flails beat time together, as they did ten years before.
At the academy, Phil and Reuben plot mischief, and they cement their friendship with not a few boyish quarrels.
Thus, Reuben, in the way of the boyish pomologists of those days, has buried at midsummer in the orchard a dozen or more of the finest windfalls from the early apple-trees, that they may mellow, away from the air, into good eating condition, and he has marked the spot in his boyish way with a little pyramid of stones. Strolling down the orchard a few days later, he sees Phil coming away from that locality, with his pockets bulging out ominously, and munching a great apple with extraordinary relish. Perhaps there is a thought that he may design a gift out of the stolen stores for Adèle; at any rate, Reuben flies at him.
"I say, Phil, that's doosed mean now, to be stealing my apples!"
"Who's stole your apples?" says Phil, with a great roar of voice.
"You have," says Reuben; and having now come near enough to find his pyramid of stones all laid low, he says more angrily,—"You're a thief! and you've got 'em in your pocket!"
"Thief!" says Phil, looking threateningly, and throwing away his apple half-eaten, "if you call me a thief, I say you're a——you know what."
"Well, blast you," says Reuben, boiling with rage, "say it! Call me a liar, if you dare!"
"I do dare," says Phil, "if you accuse me of stealing your apples; and I say you're a liar, and be darned to you!"