n that? He didn't remember mentioning the cause of his recent
retirement from public life, indeed, he was positive that this had been
a "secret" really worth keeping. However, it didn't matter now. Nothing
mattered except that he, who came of such "honorable" people, had
betrayed his friends.

"W-w-what'll happen, s'pose?"

"I don't know," answered Kate, slowly. "Something dreadful ought. For
before it was Aunt Eunice's secret the box was my secret, too. I was the
first who should have told it, and only to her. You had no right to
speak of it till I gave you leave."

"Un-un-uncle Mose broke his bones, and I h-h-had to go 'round, didn't I?
An' when I told about him the o-o-other j-j-j-just slipped out itself.
T-t-t-that's all."

"Humph! 'All!' And more mischief done than you or I can guess, maybe.
For though I can't imagine why Aunt Eunice should be so overcome and
anxious at sight of just a box, there must be some good reason. She has
seen that box before and it doesn't suggest pleasant memories to her.
That's plain. She would have been glad if it had never been found, and
all my pretty romance about treasure and helping people turns out just
horrid. I wish I had never gone to that wood, then things wouldn't have
happened. The box would have stayed in its hole, I wouldn't have hurried
home with it by the long wrong way and met you, and poor Uncle Moses
wouldn't have followed nor fallen over that root. Aunt Eunice would have
been like the saying, 'Where ignorance is bliss,' and wouldn't have been
worried so, and we shouldn't have been forbidden to tell things that I
wouldn't have cared to tell, if I hadn't been forbidden. And, oh, dear!
What a terrible hard world it is! and what a lovely old barn! I
think--Do you suppose I could climb up that hay-mow? Susanna's sure
there are hens' nests 'stolen' up there, and she needs the eggs. I wish
we could find them. I wish we could do something--anything that is
pleasant and so helps us to 'forget,' as Aunt Eunice wished us to do.
But I guess I can't climb much. I never had a chance to try."

"I'll s-s-show you!" cried the lad, eagerly, and delighted to think
there was something in which he could excel this clever city girl. With
a bound he had risen from the floor, where both had sat during the last
of their talk, had promptly spit upon his palms and rubbed them
together, then leaped to catch an upright beam. "Shinnying" up to the
slippery mow with real agility, he there pau