“I don’t care,” said Peg serenely. Already she was revelling in the thrills which would follow her tale. “Oh, Paul, you were awful mad, weren’t you?” said Peg with a delighted shiver at the memory of Paul’s terrible outburst. Never had he used such dreadful words in all his life, no matter what the provocation. Indeed, she had often heard him gloatingly predict Asa’s post mortem state because of his indulgence in that very same sort of language. “Oh, shut up!” said Paul rudely. “It was all your fault.” “I know it was, Paul,” replied Peg sweetly. She understood quite well what Paul meant, and she was not a little pleased that she had been the occasion of Paul’s moral downfall, the depth of which was but the measure of his regard for her. She was never quite sure of her standing with Paul when Adelina was about. Adelina was so much stronger and braver and could do so many more things that boys could do. Too often had she endured silent agonies of jealousy and humiliation over Paul’s evident admiration of Adelina’s many masculine virtues. Today she was quite sure that Paul would never have flung himself headlong from his pinnacle of moral rectitude for Adelina’s sake. Her mother might be “mad at her,” might indeed punish her. In her present mood of exaltation she felt she would enjoy punishment. Paul glanced at her face, puzzled not a little at her pleased serenity, and all the more deeply enraged because of that serenity. “It was your fault,” he repeated, “and I just know I’ll have to repent—or go to hell. And I don’t want to repent. I just hate to.” “Oh, never mind, Paul,” comforted Peg. “I don’t think God will care about Asa. He’s just a horrid boy, and he’s going to hell anyway, you know.” But this view of the matter brought Paul little cheer. Not but that he was quite clear in his mind as to Asa’s destiny, but he was equally clear that he could not keep up his feeling of righteous indignation against him, that in very truth before he went to sleep that night he would have to repent, a thought most distasteful to him. He turned wrathfully upon his companion. “Much you know about it,” he said scornfully, and, disdaining further conversation with her, he set off again at a gallop, lest he should fail of keeping his “point of honour” engagement.