“At Aunt Rebecca’s Janie and I climbed everything we could get up. I have been in trees almost half the time in summer; seems as much, anyway. I always could climb, but you ought to see Janie! She isn’t as plump as I am; she isn’t plump one bit; she’s thin. She goes up into anything like a squirrel. We play the loveliest things, Dirk; I know you’d like them. And you’d like Janie. She’s my best friend. She’s just as nice as she can be. I wish Janie was here in New York, too!” “Are all the girls nice down there?” asked Dirk. “I’ll bet I wouldn’t like Janie any better, anyhow!” “I’m glad you like me, Dirk, because we’re cousins and because I like you and I love loving, anyway,” said Beth, not evading the compliment. “But Janie is lovely. I suppose all the girls aren’t nice anywhere; there are some at home I don’t care about. Janie and I think it can’t be wrong not to like girls who aren’t the kind you are meant to like. Janie has a very nice mother, so she thinks that’s the reason I like her. But I haven’t any mother at all. Of course Aunt Rebecca has brought me up very carefully. I think she’s brought me up more carefully than a mother would. Mothers don’t seem to have to be so careful as great-aunts do; it comes kind of easy to them to bring up their children, sort of mixing petting and punishing. Aunt Rebecca never petted. I used to wish she would, a little, but now I’m glad she didn’t because I know she doesn’t miss me as a petting person would miss a little girl they’d brought up.” “Do you play with boys down there?” asked Dirk diffidently. “No,” said truthful Beth, “not really. Parties don’t count. Of course when you ask girls to a party you have to ask boys too, though I never could see why. Boys are----” Beth stopped short. The speech she thus checked would not have carried out her resolution to be especially nice to Dirk. “Boys are no good,” Dirk finished for her with some bitterness. “That’s what Nat and Alys think and they don’t try not to show it, like you. Nat isn’t so bad, but Alys! I’d be sorry for boys if they weren’t as nice as some girls!” “They are, Dirk; they truly are!” cried Beth eagerly. “That’s just it! It’s _some_ boys and _some_ girls, both ways, nice and not nice! It isn’t _all_ boys and _all_ girls, either way. I think you’re ever so nice; I think you’re nice as a boy and not just as a cousin. And I’m sure Alys does, too, only sometimes sisters and brothers get into a way of fussing; I’ve noticed that at home. Don’t you tease Alys?” suggested Beth gently. “Sure thing,” admitted Dirk promptly. “But she’s the kind you want to. I started in to tease you, but after you held your tongue that Sunday and got me out of a scrape I didn’t want to any more, you can bet your last on that! You’re the kind you don’t want to tease. Alys is looking for trouble with me so she gets it. I’d hate to bother you, Beth, honest. You don’t get mad; you look so surprised and sorry it’s no fun.”