"O-oh! Do you know--do you know--sometimes I get so mad that I'd just like to wring the neck of every boy in the world!" Margery alone had nothing to say. She stooped to pick up the only two jaw-breakers that were left. These were on the pavement, for, in snatching, Willie had knocked them out of her hands. "I--I don't believe I want any jaw-breakers to-day." Margery spoke with a slight quaver. "You--you two can have them." She offered one to Rosie, but Rosie, instead of taking it, threw her arms impulsively about Margery's neck. "You poor thing! That'd be nice, now, wouldn't it? And you not have even one of your own jaw-breakers! No! I just tell you what we'll do: You'll have one whole one for yourself, and me and Janet'll divide the other. I'll suck it for a block, and then Janet can suck it for a block." This was the arrangement finally agreed upon. "And wouldn't you like to come with us, Margery, while I finish up my paper route?" Yes, Margery would just as soon do that as anything else. Rosie petted and comforted her as best she could, teaching her how to wrap a paper that is to be thrown on a porch, explaining to her the scale of profits in the newspaper business, and giving her interesting bits of family history about the various houses where they stopped. Had she been alone with Rosie, Margery would have been allowed to forget somewhat her recent troubles. In fact, she almost did forget them once or twice at moments when Janet McFadden was busy sucking the jaw-breaker. But the instant it became Rosie's turn to suck, Janet was back again on the old subject. "Ha, ha! Don't you think I know 'em?" The _'em_ of Janet's acquaintance were, of course, Willie Jones and his kind. "Oh, I tell you, I know 'em just as well! They're all the same, every last one of them, always getting the best of us, and then going off by themselves and having a good time! I tell you, if I had my way, things'd be different! Oh, I tell you, if we'd all just get together and treat 'em like they ought to be treated, it--it--it--it'd be just good for 'em--it would!" Of course, everything Janet said was gospel truth, and there was no gainsaying it; but even truth is sometimes depressing, and not the thing one wishes forever to have dinned into one's ears. "And I know just as well as I know my own name, Margery, that now, after he's acted this way, he'll be coming back trying to make friends with you. You needn't tell me! I know him! But listen here, Margery, don't have a thing to do with him! Don't ever speak to him again, and pretend you don't even see him. He's not worth it--honestly he's not!"