I relented, and let him in. He pressed the coin into my hand. I refused; he pleaded.
“You found it,” I said, “it's yours.”
“But—but you were looking for it.”
“That makes no difference,” I declared magnanimously.
Curiosity overcame him.
“Say, Hughie, if you didn't drop it, who on earth did?”
“Nobody on earth,” I replied cryptically....
Naturally, I declined to reveal the secret. Nor was this by any means the only secret I held over the Peters family, who never quite knew what to make of me. They were not troubled with imaginations. Julia was a little older than Tom and had a sharp tongue, but over him I exercised a distinct fascination, and I knew it. Literal himself, good-natured and warm-hearted, the gift I had of tingeing life with romance (to put the thing optimistically), of creating kingdoms out of back yards—at which Julia and Russell sniffed—held his allegiance firm.