Aunt Ellen will think her plums
have been all a-growing!"
"No, no, boys!" cried his mother, "I can't have it done. To steal
your aunt's own plums to deceive her with!"
"We always may do as we like with that tree," said Johnny, "because
they are so nasty, and won't keep."
"How nice for the preserves!" observed Bobus.
"They would do just as well to hinder Mother Carey from catching it."
"No, no, boys; I ought to 'catch it!' It was all my fault for not
putting the plums away."
"You won't tell of us," growled Robin, between lips that he opened
wide enough the next moment to admit one of three surviving plums.
"If I tell her I left them about in the boys' way, she will arrive at
the natural conclusion."
"Do they call those things magnum bonum?" asked Janet, as the boys
drifted away.
"Yes," said her mother, looking at her rather wonderingly; and
adding, as Janet coloured up to the eyes, "My dear, have you any
other association with the name?"
Many a time Janet had longed to tell all she knew; now, when so good
an opportunity had come, all was choked back by the strange leaden
weight of reserve, and shame in that long reserve.
She opened her eyes and stared as stupidly at her mother as Robin
could have done, feeling an utter incapacity of making any reply; and
Caroline, who had for a moment thought she understood, was baffled,
and durst not pursue the subject for fear of betraying her own
secret, deciding within herself that Janet might have caught up the
word without understanding.
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