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“Sweethearts?” cried Aunt Kipp, turning red in the face.

“Yes’m. Van settled it last week, and Polly’s been so happy ever since. Mother likes it, and I like it, for I’m fond of Van, though I do call him Baa-baa, because he looks like a sheep. We all like it, and we ‘d all say so, if we were not afraid of you. Mother and Polly, I mean; of course we men don’t mind, but we don’t want a fuss. You won’t make one, will you, now?”

Anything more expressive of brotherly good-will, persuasive frankness, and a placid consciousness of having “fixed it,” than Toady’s dirty little face, it would be hard to find. Aunt Kipp eyed him so fiercely that even before she spoke a dim suspicion that something was wrong began to dawn on his too-confiding soul.

“I don’t like it, and I’ll put a stop to it. I won’t have any ridiculous baa-baas in my family. If Mary counts on my money to begin housekeeping with, she’ll find herself mistaken; for not one penny shall she have, married or single, and you may tell her so.”

Toady was so taken aback by this explosion that he let go his shoe-strings, fell over with a crash, and lay flat, with shovel and tongs spread upon him like a pall. In rushed Mrs. Snow and Polly, to find the boy’s spirits quite quenched, for once, and Aunt Kipp in a towering passion. It all came out in one overwhelming flood of words, and Toady fled from the storm to wander round the house, a prey to the deepest remorse. The meekness of that boy at dinner-time was so angelic that Mrs. Snow would have feared speedy translation for him, if she had not been very angry. Polly’s red eyes, and Aunt Kipp’s griffinesque expression of countenance, weighed upon his soul so heavily, that even roly-poly pudding failed to assuage his trouble, and, taking his mother into the china-closet, he anxiously inquired “if it was all up with Polly?”

“I’m afraid so, for aunt vows she will make a new will to-morrow, and leave every penny to the Charitable Rag-bag Society,” sighed Mrs. Snow.

“I didn’t mean to do it, I truly didn’t! I thought I’d just ‘give her a hint,’ as you say. She looked all right, and laughed when I told her about being a bore, and I thought she liked it. If she was a man, I’d thrash her for making Polly cry;” and Toady shook his fist at Aunt Kipp’s umbrella, which was an immense relief to his perturbed spirit.

“Bless the boy! I do believe he would!” cried Mrs. Snow, watching the little turkey-cock with maternal pride. “You can’t do that: so just be careful and not make any more mischief, dear.”

“I’ll try, mother; but I’m always getting into scrapes with Aunt Kipp. She’s worse than measles, any day,–such an old aggrawater! Van’s coming this afternoon, won’t he make her pleasant again?”

“Oh, dear, no! He will probably make things ten times worse, he’s so bashful and queer. I’m afraid our last chance is gone, deary, and we must rub along as we have done.”

One sniff of emotion burst from Toady, and for a moment he laid his head in the knife-tray, overcome with disappointment and regret. But scorning to yield to unmanly tears, he was soon himself again. Thrusting his beloved jackknife, with three blades and a file, into Polly’s hand, he whispered, brokenly,–

“Keep it forever ‘n’ ever; I’m awful sorry!” Then, feeling that the magnitude of this sacrifice atoned for everything, he went to watch for Van,–the forlorn hope to which he now clung.

II

“Sophy, I’m surprised at your want of judgment. Do you really mean to let your girl marry this Lamb? Why, the man’s a fool!” began Aunt Kipp, after dinner, by way of opening a pleasant conversation with her relatives.

“Dear me, aunt! how can you know that, when you never saw him?” mildly returned Mrs. Snow.