"But you couldn't see the frocks and coats in the picture, Dot?" "O no, dadda, 'cause they was hided away, and Gazi telled a wicked tory, and saided he hadn't not been nowhere. 'N then he was whited. Does everybody get whited what tells wicked tories? Does ma-ma when she tells tories?" Mrs. Cragg was the reverse of white at this instant. Cragg uttered a hasty "Sh-sh-sh!" glancing at his wife as he did so. Something in her face made him repeat the look, even while he said again, "Hush! Hush! Little girls must never talk so. Hold your little tongue, Dot; that won't do at all." Then his eyes fell upon Pattie. She had moved slightly, under the stress of feeling, and he could see her better than before. "Why, Pattie, you've been crying!" he exclaimed. CHAPTER XIII What Had Gone Wrong CRAGG welcomed a change of subject. He could not, unhappily, feel sure that no cause existed for Dot's remarks, nor could he throw himself unreservedly into the defence of his wife. By this time he knew, only too well, that Mrs. Cragg was by no means always true in her utterances, that very often she was guilty of what Dot called "a tory." He was therefore the more anxious to divert attention at this moment. "Why, Pattie, you've been crying!" "One must—sometimes—cry a little," admitted Pattie, not trying to deny so patent a fact. "Being a girl, perhaps one must. And it is nothing that I can set right? You are sure?" "Quite sure," she said, tears in her eyes again. "I'll tell you more by-and-by; but there is nothing to be done." "Pattie was crying, 'way in her loom," declared Dot, who never failed to put her small finger into every pie that happened to be going. "You mustn't let Pattie cry any more, Dot. It's bad for her. If she does, come and tell me." "All wite," nodded Dot cheerfully. Tea presently came to an end, and Pattie noted as an unusual event that Mrs. Cragg had not flown into a passion. But little time remained for that or for other observations, since she and Cragg had to dress at once for church. Mrs. Cragg seldom troubled herself to go in the evening. Coming out of church an hour and a half later, Cragg said, as he walked beside Pattie in the twilight: "What has been wrong to-day?" "I can't tell you all, but—part, if you like. It is about my father's letters." "Yes. What have you done?" "I have burnt them. Not to-day, but two or three days ago." "You have!" "I thought it right." "In that case there's nothing to be said. People must follow their consciences, of course. But why?" "I was afraid you might persuade me to read them—against what I felt to be right." "Have I been so positive?" "No. But you are so kind a friend to me, I might have felt bound to do what you advised. And I could not think it right. I could not feel sure that my father would wish it. So I glanced them through—just to see that there was no money, and that there were no directions to me about things he might want done. And then I burnt them."