Hortense, she explained, was become
too big to prank on the commons.
"Faith, mademoiselle," said I ruefully, "an she mayn't play war on the
commons, what may she play?"
"Beau!" teases mademoiselle, perking her lips saucily; and she shut the
door in my face.
It seemed a silly answer enough, but it put a notion in a lad's head.
I would try it on Rebecca.
When I re-entered the window, the dominie still slept. Rebecca, the
demure monkey, bent over her lesson book as innocently as though there
were no turnstiles.
"Rebecca," I whispered, leaning across the bench, "you are big enough
to have a--what? Guess."
"Go away, Ramsay Stanhope!" snapped Rebecca, grown mighty good of a
sudden, with glance fast on her white stomacher.
"O-ho! Crosspatch," thought I; and from no other motive than
transgressing the forbidden, I reached across to distract the attentive
goodness of the prim little baggage; but--an iron grip lifted me bodily
from the bench.
It was Eli Kirke, wry-faced, tight-lipped. He had seen all! This was
the secret of Mistress Rebecca's new-found diligence. No syllable was
uttered, but it was the awfullest silence that ever a lad heard. I was
lifted rather than led upstairs and left a prisoner in locked room with
naught to do but gnaw my conscience and gaze at the woods skirting the
crests of the inland hills.
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