He retired to the clothes-tree in the side yard—there were no junipers there—and cursed his gods. To have made her cry! They thought he didn’t care, but oh, he did! He felt as if he had eaten a cold, gray stone that weighed down his stomach. The cat slunk by, but he threw nothing at her, and his neighbor’s St. Bernard puppy rolled inquiringly into the hedge, stuck there, and thrashed about helplessly, but he said nothing to frighten it. He thought of supper—they had spoken of cinnamon rolls and little yellow custards—but without the usual thrill. What was the matter? Was he going to be sick? There seemed no outlook to life—one thing was as good as another. He regarded going to bed with a dull acquiescence. As well that as anything else. It might be eight o’clock now for all he cared. At night his mother came and sat for a moment on the side of the bed. “Papa doesn’t want you to feel too bad, dear,” she said. “He knows that you never meant to frighten Cecelia so. You know that little girls are very different from little boys in some ways. Things that seem—er—amusing to you, seem very cruel to them. To-morrow would you like to send her some flowers and write her a little note, and tell her how sorry you are?” He could not speak, but he seized his mother’s hand and kissed it up to her lace ruffle. The cold, gray stone melted away from his stomach; again the future stretched rosily vague before him. In happy dreams he did the honors of the rat-hole to a sweet, shy guest. In the morning he applied himself to his note of apology; his sister ruled the lines on a beautiful sheet of paper with a curly gold “P” at the top, and he bent to his task with extended tongue and lines between his eyes. Hitherto his mother had been his only correspondent. He carried her the note with a sense of justifiable pride. “It’s spelled all right,” he said, “because every word I didn’t know I asked Bess, and she told me.” _My dear Cecelia_: I am going to send you some flowrs. I am sory they bite them of but they do. I hope you did not hafto lite the gas. we are all well and haveing a good time. with much love I am your loving son. RICHARD CARR PENDLETON. “Bess did the periods, but I remembered the large I’s myself,” he added comfortably. “Is it all right?” His mother left the room abruptly, and he, supposing it to be one of her many suddenly-remembered errands, was mercifully unconscious of any connection between himself and the roars of laughter that came from his father’s study. “Just as it is, mind you. Lizzie, just as it is!” his father called after her as she came out again; and though she insisted that it was too absurd, and that something was the matter with her children, she was sure, nevertheless she kissed him with no particular occasion, and held her peace nobly when he selected a hideous purple blossom with spotty leaves, assisted by the interested florist.